


Build Some Dreams

by enoughtotemptme



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Accidental Pregnancy, Alternate Universe - Bar/Pub, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, Minor John Murphy/Monroe, Minor Octavia Blake/Lincoln, Minor Raven Reyes/Kyle Wick, POV Alternating, Work In Progress
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-03-12
Updated: 2017-08-05
Packaged: 2018-03-17 07:24:52
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 16
Words: 65,167
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3520508
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/enoughtotemptme/pseuds/enoughtotemptme
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is the story of how one night, two strangers, and three months apart make for a hell of a surprise.</p><p>Winner of the 2015 Bellarke Fanfiction Award for Best Pregnancy Fiction.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I just want to feel joy again after the finale, so I'm taking a shot at an accidental pregnancy fic. Title is from Kip Moore's "Hey Pretty Girl" because pillaging song lyrics is the only way I know how to title.

When Clarke first sees him on Halloween, she’s one morgue-arita past caring that she’s not the type of girl to hook up with random strangers in a drunken tryst. But Raven’s disappeared with that scruffy Thor who complimented her Wednesday costume, and Monroe’s busy dry-humping Murphy out on Mount Weather’s dance floor, so Clarke’s left with, well, tequila. Until she spots him, that is.

She doesn’t really see how anyone could blame her for the indiscretion, honestly. He’s dressed as the hottest pirate she’s ever seen, and when it only takes one smile and a crooked finger for him to weave through the crowd to her side, she knows the attraction is mutual.

Sure, his Johnny Depp impression isn’t quite up to snuff––his attempted British accent sounds more Australian, and the eyeliner he claims his sister forced on him looks more like warpaint––but when she laughs at his attempted “ _Savvy_?” he just grins right back. And then the way they’re grinning at each other stops being funny and starts sizzling instead, and he asks her to dance.

The dance turns into two, and then three; and then they leave the dance floor with the idea that they should get some water and end up pressed against one another, mouths fused, as they stumble into the storeroom in the back of the club.

He locks the door and then pushes her against it, and she feels him hot and heavy against her belly, even through those silly pirate trousers and the filmy gauze of her Princess Buttercup dress. Her fingers pluck at the laces, and he groans into her mouth when she brushes against his erection. She can’t get the pants undone, and he pulls away, panting, pupils blown wide to hurriedly undo them himself. She hastily wiggles her own panties down until they’re left hooked around one ankle. The second his pants are shoved down enough to free his cock, he starts to ruck up her skirt and she clutches his shoulders.

Once her dress is out of the way, he grabs her by the thighs and hitches her up against the door, his weight pinning her in place and holding her aloft. She moans and bucks forward when he slides against her slick heat, brushing against her clit and sending little sparks of pleasure through her.

She barely registers that his groaning words are actually a question about protection, and while the room spins in a combination of the alcohol and his touch, she pants out that she’s on the pill, only vaguely thinking that there was something else about that she should be remembering.

And then he’s inside her, moving in fast, short strokes that have Clarke’s toes curling inside of her princess slippers. She can’t do much except hold on tight, her nails digging into his skin through the cotton of his shirt, but he must like it because each time her hands clench he thrusts a little harder. It’s astonishing how fast he has her whimpering and clenching around him, and then one particular little hitch of his hips has him grinding hard just once against her clit, and she’s gone. Through the heavy burst of pleasure, she feels him duck his head to the curve of her neck and bite her skin to muffle his groan as he comes. The just-right sensation of his teeth sets off another little flutter of sensation that has him muttering a curse when he feels it, but he just holds her tighter.

* * *

When she wakes up the next morning in her own bed, she remembers his face clearly, but remembers the party and fucking in the back of club only vaguely. There’s a partial recollection of straightening clothes and returning to the dance floor, but that’s about it for the rest of the night. From the pounding in her skull, she figures she must have gone straight back for more of those shitty morgue-aritas. At least she remembered to retrieve her panties, she thinks, noticing them next to her crown on top of the haphazard pile of her clothing from last night.

She wanders out into the kitchen and sees Raven at the dining table, groaning into a plate of pancakes.

“You are a goddess,” Clarke tells her as she puts together a plate of the wonderful starchy food for herself. She’s always hated maple syrup, so she slathers her pancakes in butter and mounds of powdered sugar. “An absolute goddess.”

“I know,” Raven replies. “You tell me that every time I make pancakes.” She stabs at her plate and pops a bite into her mouth with a grunt.

“Anything I should remember about last night and don’t?” Clarke asks, eyeing her friend’s disgruntled expression.

Raven glares at her. “You puked in my purse on the cab ride home last night.”

Clarke cringes. “Gross.”

“Tell me about it,” Raven mutters. “Now it’s only good for your barf bag. You’re lucky I was holding my phone and I’d already spent all my cash.”

Clarke sighs and pours herself a cup of coffee. “Okay, I’m sorry for puking in your purse, but don’t forget that I was there when you found it for a dollar at Goodwill. You only bought it because it went with your costume.”

“Hey, I could’ve grown to like the black pleather and the skull decals,” Raven retorts as Clarke sits across from her at the table. “You never know. It could have become my favorite purse.”

“Raven.”

“Okay, no, it was a hideous piece of trash.”

Clarke sips her coffee as she eyes her friend. “Anything else happen?” she says in a leading tone. “With a certain hot Asgardian?”

Raven sneers, but her cheeks also flush.

“Oh my god,” Clarke gasps, “You think he’s _gorgeous,_ you want to _kiss_ him, you want to _hug_ him––”

“ _Stop_ quoting _Miss Congeniality_ right now or I will suffocate you in your pancakes,” Raven growls.

Clarke tries to stifle her giggles, but still nearly ends up with coffee up her nose when she accidentally lets out a snort.

“No, no, I’m sorry,” Clarke says when she’s finally calmed down enough to speak normally. “What’s his name?”

“Kyle,” Raven says shortly, the flush reappearing on her cheeks. “Kyle Wick.”

“You want to _love_ him,” Clarke whispers into her coffee mug, then yelps when Raven pinches her arm.

“Don’t think I didn’t notice you with _your_ lover boy, Griffin,” Raven says. “What’s the deal with him?”

“Ah…” Clarke feels her cheeks warm. “I…”

“Clarke,” Raven warns.

“He had great hair? And freckles, too, _great_ freckles,” Clarke offers.

“And? What was his name?”

“Um, well,” Clarke begins in a high-pitched voice; she stops and clears her throat. “Well, you see, I don’t think I ever, you know, really. Got it. His name, I mean.”

Clarke refuses to look at Raven, though she can feel the other woman’s stare burning a hole in her face.

“What, were you two too _busy_ , or something?” Raven asks skeptically, then gasps when Clarke winces. “Are you serious? Clarke!”

“Stop hitting me,” Clarke complains, batting away Raven’s attempts to get Clarke to look at her.

“I can’t believe you, Clarke Griffin, had an anonymous Halloween hook up. Oh my god, where’d you do it? I didn’t notice when you left.”

Clarke stuffs a forkful of pancakes in her mouth so she can’t answer, but Raven’s too sharp.

“In the _club_? Holy shit, Clarke!”

“We were drunk,” Clarke mumbles around the pancakes. Her face is on fire at this point. “I had more tequila than I want to think about.”

“Wow,” Raven says. “Color me impressed.”

“Eat your goddamned pancakes, Reyes.”

* * *

Clarke doesn’t remember the lack of a condom for over a week, and then the memory hits her like a forgotten dream as she’s snuggling into her pillow at night.

Her eyes fly open and she stares up at the dark ceiling. “Shit,” she whispers. “Shit, shit, shit, _shit._ ”

She isn’t been able to sleep much after that, so she is waiting with her cell phone in hand for the moment her gynecologist’s office opens.

“Goddamnit,” she whispers, nibbling on her thumbnail while the phone rings. Who knows what kind of skeevy diseases she could have picked up from that guy? Sure, he didn’t _seem_ like the type to fuck a girl without a condom if he knew he had an STD, but lots of people didn’t ever present with symptoms.

When the receptionist finally answers, it’s only to tell Clarke that she can’t get in for an appointment for another week. Clarke sighs and takes the soonest one she can get, then drags herself into the shower.

Once she’s clean, she can’t help but mope around the house, and apparently she’s being obvious enough about it that eventually Raven sighs and asks her what’s wrong.

Clarke opens her mouth to tell her, but finds herself cringing at the thought of the conversation that will undoubtedly follow.

“Nothing big,” she says eventually. “I just didn’t get one of the jobs I wanted.”

Raven scoffs at her. “You’re always complaining about having too many! Jeez, count your blessings.”

“Yeah, I’ll try.” Clarke tries for a smile, and it’s good enough to convince Raven that Clarke was telling the truth.

She spends the extra seven days burying herself in those jobs, hoping that if she’s busy with new illustrations she won’t be able to agonize over potential STDs.

(No such luck.)

* * *

On the day of her appointment, Dr. Nyko absorbs her shamefaced story and request for STD testing with his usual calm expression, and then proceeds to ask her all the standard questions: how’s her health, are there any changes to her medication, etc.

Clarke reminds him about her allergy medication and tells him about the sinus infection she had about a month ago. Part of why Clarke likes her doctor so much is that he doesn’t waste any time on awkward small talk while he’s all up in her business, so his examination for physical STD symptoms is over quickly, and he takes the swabs he needs for the lab.

“I’m going to send in one of the nurses for a blood sample, alright Clarke?” he says, and she nods. “Just to be as thorough as possible.”

“That’s what I wanted,” she replies. Dr. Nyko gives her a smile and then leaves the room.

She hates needles, hates needles near her veins even more, but she wants to eliminate the possibility of every possible STD so that she can breathe easily again.

Clarke looks away when the nurse comes in, unable to watch even as her skin is cleaned and prepped for blood to be drawn, let alone as the needle pierces her skin. She always feels like a wimp every time she has to sit there with her eyes tightly shut until the cotton ball is taped to the inside of her elbow.

“All done,” the dark-haired nurse says soon, and he gives her a gentle smile when she opens her eyes. “Your test results should be ready in about a week, okay? Dr. Nyko will call you when they’re in.”

“Thanks,” Clarke says with a grateful nod.

* * *

Clarke’s next work project is the cover for the third book in a new children’s series, one that’s predicted to be the next _Percy Jackson_ or _Harry Potter._ She really likes the story, too, and she wants to do an amazing job, so the importance of the work is enough to keep her preoccupied for the next week.

Well, mostly. She only has time to google “symptoms of STDs” three or four times, like, a day. And she only curses herself for not getting the goddamned pirate’s number so she could ask him about his sexual history, like, once or twice. An hour. But really, most of the time she’s totally focused on her painting. Swear.

Who the hell is she trying to kid? When her phone _finally_ lights up with the doctor’s office’s number, she nearly ruins her work in progress by tossing away her paintbrush so she can snatch the phone up.

“Hello?” she says breathlessly.

“Clarke?” she hears Dr. Nyko’s voice say.

“This is she,” Clarke replies. “How are you, Dr. Nyko?”

“I’m doing just fine, thanks,” he says. “And according to your test results, you’re doing pretty well yourself.”

Clarke sighs in relief as the words are coming across the line. Then something about his phrasing catches her notice.

“Only ‘pretty well,’ huh?” she asks, and starts to chew on the inside of her cheek. The hand not holding her phone starts to worry at the little mole on her thigh. “What–What’s going on?”

“Clarke,” his voice says kindly. “Your tests show that you’re negative for any STDs. So that’s great. You’ll want to come in again in a couple of months for follow-up HIV tests, but that’s standard procedure.”

“That all sounds good,” Clarke says slowly. “But…”

“But,” Dr. Nyko agrees. “You’re STD free, but your blood tests did come back positive for pregnancy.”

Clarke’s fingers on her thigh still; her teeth stop moving against her cheek. She doesn’t…what?

“What?” she whispers. “But I’m on the pill.” There’s clearly been some kind of mix-up at the lab.

“That’s true,” Dr. Nyko says. “But sometimes antibiotics can make the pill less effective. Usually I recommend to my patients not to have sex for about a week after a course of antibiotics have finished.”

Clarke thinks back to that stupid sinus infection, tries to remember the days until Halloween. She’d finished her antibiotics on the twenty-sixth.

“I–” she breaks off. She doesn’t have a clue what to say.

“I know this is big news, Clarke,” he tells her. “But you’ve got some time to soak it in, figure things out. Can you make it to an appointment with me next Tuesday at one? I’d like to examine you more thoroughly, answer any questions you might have.”

“Uh,” Clarke says blankly, and digs around for her planner. With fingers that feel like they’ve gone numb, she fumbles to the correct page. “Yeah. Tuesday at one. I’ll be there.” She picks up her discarded paintbrush, too preoccupied to look for a pen, and paints in the appointment.

“Great,” Dr. Nyko replies. “In the meantime, go ahead and stop taking your birth control pills, alright? And check the practice’s website––there’s a good list of Dos and Don’ts you should take a look at.”

Clarke agrees mindlessly and then hangs up.

* * *

Eventually she shuffles out of her studio and to the kitchen. She hasn't eaten yet today, so she forces herself to eat a nutella banana sandwich. Then she immediately regrets it as her stomach seems to turn over.

She braces one hand on her kitchen counter and takes a slow, deep breath, but it sticks in her lungs like tar.

Clarke thinks about how only a week ago, all she wanted was to get back her test results so she could breathe easily again.

Breathe easily again?

What a fucking joke.

Clarke knows she should go back into her studio, clean her brushes and put away her paints, but she doesn’t. Instead she drags the comforter off of her bed and brings it with her to the couch, where she curls up and watches _Pride and Prejudice_ on repeat until Raven comes home from the lab. She tries to convince herself it’s just that Jane’s so sad, and Bingley’s so sad, and everyone’s so _sad_ in this movie that she’s crying.

But when Raven walks in the door, yelling something about getting takeout, Clarke knows it’s not.

“I’m in here,” she calls, freeing a hand from her blanket cocoon to try and wipe at her damp face.

“I’m kind of in the mood for Indian tonight, but pizza’s always good, and I couldn’t decide, so you have to choose or we’ll end up with chicken tikka stuffed crust pizza,” Raven says as she wanders into the living room. When Clarke doesn’t immediately say anything, she glances up from the takeout menus she’s shuffling in her hands.

“Clarke?” Raven’s eyes are wide, no doubt taking in Clarke’s red eyes, her prone position on the couch. The television is still playing Keira Knightley in the background, which Raven finally notices.

“Why are you in breakup mode?” she asks, confused. “I didn’t even know you were dating anyone.”

Clarke bites her lip to try and keep it from trembling, but it’s no use when she knows Raven’s just going to keep pushing for an explanation.

“I messed up, Raven,” Clarke chokes out, and then bursts into tears.

Raven drops the menus and crawls onto the couch until she’s lying beside Clarke. Clarke turns her face until it’s tucked against Raven’s collar like a child’s, and lets herself cry. It’s several minutes of Raven stroking her hair, waiting in that focused silence of hers, before Clarke’s sobs trail off and she can breathe easily enough to speak clearly again.

“You’re always so quiet,” Clarke says finally, sniffing. “Whenever anyone cries. It’s intense.”

“It’s because I’m waiting to hear who hurt you, and I’m busy planning their murder,” Raven replies.

Clarke lets out a watery laugh.

“Give it up, Griffin,” Raven says gently. “What’s up?”

“No one hurt me,” Clarke sighs. “If I anything, I hurt myself.”

“Clarke…”

She opens her mouth, and the words are hard to say, but not as impossible as she had expected. “I’m pregnant.”

She can feel Raven tense in surprise.

“...What?”

Clarke groans and shifts until Raven moves and they can both sit upright on the couch.

“I’m pregnant,” she repeats tiredly. “STD-free, at least, unless you count an embryo as a sexually transmitted disease.”

Raven stares at her. “Jesus, Clarke.”

“I know.”

“Are you sure?” Raven asks after a moment. “Like, did you take multiple tests?”

“I got the news from my gynecologist today when he called me with the results of my STD tests,” Clarke says. “He was pretty sure about it.”

“Shit, Clarke,” she replies. “Who?”

“The guy from the Halloween party at Mount Weather,” Clarke says miserably. “We didn’t use a condom, and I didn’t know my birth control had gotten screwed up from my antibiotics, and I worried I’d gotten an STD but instead I got knocked up.”

She takes a deep breath when she feels the sting of tears threatening again. Raven watches her quietly.

Eventually, she asks, “What are you going to do?”

“I don’t know,” Clarke says. “I’ve got an appointment on Tuesday. I guess I should try to figure it out by then.” She hesitates, then adds in a small voice, “Will you go with me?”

Raven smiles at her. “Yeah, Clarke. I’ll go.”

* * *

By Tuesday, Clarke’s list of pros and cons is as complete as it’s going to get.

 

**_Pros of Baby:_ **

_Babies are often cute, sometimes smell good_

_I’m a 25 year old adult_

_I eventually want to have kids_

_I’m gainfully employed_

_Inheritance from Dad, Nana and Gramps_

_I work from home––easier to care for baby? No need for maternity leave?_

_Have room in house––Monroe’s old bedroom could be nursery?_

_No periods!!_

_Already live in good school district_

 

**_Cons of Baby:_ **

_Babies are often smelly/dirty/gross/loud_

_I’m ONLY 25_

_Could still have kids LATER_

_Would have to give BIRTH_

_Would have crappy pregnancy symptoms_

_Baby Daddy????_

_~~I would be raising a baby alone for the next EIGHTEEN YEARS~~ _

(Raven disagreed with that one, and rewrote the entry below.)

 

_I would be raising a baby with the help of my glorious friends for the next EIGHTEEN YEARS_

_College tuition will be VERY EXPENSIVE in eighteen years (though more expensive if I wait even later??)_

 

Clarke stares at the yellow legal pad and fidgets on the exam table while they wait for Dr. Nyko.  

“Did I miss anything?” she asks Raven.

“Clarke,” Raven groans. "You’ve asked me that at _least_ ten times. We both know that all the important things are on the list.”

“I just—I just want to be sure,” Clarke says. “That I’ve thought of everything.”

“I’m pretty sure there is no possible way to think of everything, especially when there are potential human beings involved?” Raven replies. “Maybe you should add _that_ to the cons.”

Clarke grimaces at her, but scribbles “Unpredictable” down on the list.

There’s a quick knock on the door, then Dr. Nyko enters the exam room. Clarke’s already been ordered to dress in the stupid gown, and after a brief greeting Clarke is suffering through the indignity of a transvaginal ultrasound.

“There it is,” the doctor says, pointing to the tiny little blur in a sea of black.

“Oh god,” Clarke whispers, staring at the screen. She swallows hard as Dr. Nyko takes a few notes.

Even when the ultrasound is over, and the machine is turned off, Clarke can’t stop thinking about that staticky little shape. Raven has to poke her in the arm before she realizes Dr. Nyko is speaking to her.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” she says, cheeks flushing. “I was distracted.”

“That’s perfectly understandable, don’t worry. I was asking, where would you like to go from here, Clarke?” he asks. “I can go over different options for you, if you’d like. Or I can get you some literature that you can take home?”

Clarke bites lip and looks over at Raven, who arches her brow.

“I-I don’t need to know the options. I’m going to keep it,” she says in a rush, and the admission sends simultaneous floods of exhilaration and terror through her body.

Raven gives her a slow grin, reaches out and squeezes Clarke’s arm.

Dr. Nyko just nods at her with a smile. “Then, Clarke, let me say congratulations. You’re going to have a baby around the end of July.”

And just like that, it’s even more real. There’s a deadline––a due date. In the middle of summer, she’s going to have a baby. She’s going to be a mother.

Holy _crap_.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Raven + Clarke BFFs 5ever
> 
> Thanks for just accepting the liberties I took with medical visit procedures, and also Clarke's various freakouts. 
> 
> This fic is a work in progress, so updates are definitely not going to be as frequent as they were with _Fall Back Together_. Plus I'm in the middle of my master's thesis, and my last quarter of grad school is starting in a couple of weeks! But all kudos and especially all comments are really encouraging, so please let me know your thoughts!


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's been three months since Bellamy met her, but she's still got a crown.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Now to Bellamy.

When Bellamy emerges from the stockroom and sees the small group of women seated around a high little table in his section of the bar, he stifles a sigh and pastes on his best flirtatious-bartender smile. He usually doesn’t care what types of groups are seated in his section, but tonight he’s dancing around a migraine and three women wearing sparkly tiaras are likely to require more attention than his aching head wants to provide.  

There are three of them, a blonde and a brunette and a ginger. He guesses they’ve been pregaming, because for just having arrived at Grounders, the brunette and the ginger especially are _far_ too giggly to be fully sober. The brunette’s tiara is tilted at a cocky angle, and the ginger’s that says “BACHELORETTE” in rhinestones keeps sliding down her forehead, but though she’s seated with her back to him, he can tell that the blonde’s tiara is perfectly, primly placed.

“Good evening, ladies,” Bellamy says with a grin as he rounds their table. “What can I get for you all?”

The brunette rakes his body with her eyes and the ginger giggles, but he’s mostly preoccupied with the blonde who turns to smile politely back at him. When they lock eyes and her mouth drops open a little in surprise, his grin becomes less forced.

Well, hell.

He knows this woman. The last time he’d seen her, her lips had been swollen and her cheeks had been flushed from a good, quick fuck in the storage room of Mount Weather, and somehow her delicate silver crown was still miraculously in place.

So, if by _know_ he means _met and fucked on Halloween at a club his sister dragged him to_ , then, yeah, he knows her.

“Hey,” he greets her. “Still a princess, I see.”

“I–” she stutters, eyes wide. “Um, hi.”

“Who’re you?” the ginger asks curiously, leaning forward and then needing to shove her slipping crown back into place.

“Bellamy,” he says, and waves his order pad at the blonde. “We know each other.”

The blonde makes a strangled little noise, and yeah, alright, they never even told each other their names––what? they were both drunk at the time––but he’s _definitely_ thought about the hot blonde in the princess costume more than once since that night three months ago. Even if he doesn’t know her well, that doesn’t mean he hasn’t been wanting to know her better.

“Anyway, what can I get you tonight?” Bellamy asks when it’s clear the princess doesn’t really know what to say to him. She seems disproportionately grateful for the reprieve.

“I’ll have a ginger ale,” the blonde says, then gestures at the brunette and ginger in turn. “Raven will have a paloma, Monroe a lemon drop. And an order of chicken wings, maybe, to soak up the alcohol before they’re drunk off their faces.”

The little smile he directs her way this time is completely genuine, commiserating.

“Designated driver, huh?” he asks, jotting down the orders out of habit, though he’s never once forgotten an order in the eight years he’s worked there.

“My lot in life,” she says, and manages a small smile back. She seems a little tired for it being only nine at night, though it might be just the dim lighting of the bar.

“Well, DDs get drinks on the house,” Bellamy replies. Actually, they don’t, not really, but Bellamy’s manager now and––well, he doesn’t really have an excuse. He just wants to. Besides, what’s the harm of a few free sodas? “Let me know if you ever want anything different. I’ll get the paloma and lemon drop started in the meantime.”

“The ginger ale is fine,” the blonde says firmly. “Thank you.”

The brunette––Raven, apparently––also says thanks, albeit in a highly suggestive drawl as he walks back behind the bar. When he glances back, the blonde is frowning tightly at Raven as the apparent bride-to-be––Monroe? interesting name––giggles into a palm.

He throws together the drinks, then spends way too long debating on what color straw to give the blonde’s ginger ale. He eventually settles on blue, if only because he noticed that her eyes are a soft summer sky blue. They’re hard to miss, alright?

After dropping off their first round, Bellamy finds himself keeping tabs on them all night. He tries telling himself that it’s just because they’re in _his_ section, so they’re his responsibility, but he’s not quite able to fool himself. Whenever he glances over, the three of them are usually propping their elbows on the table, leaning forward and talking animatedly. Once he’s close enough to hear when they all burst out laughing, and the sound of it puts a smile on his own face, and the pounding in his head eases a little as he glances over to see the blonde princess giggle.

Once when he looks over, they’re gone from the table, but it only takes a second to spot the flash of golden curls in the middle of the dance floor. It’s the same thing, that golden glint, that had drawn his attention at that party. Right now he can’t see much more of her than that, but as she and her two friends jump and dance, he tidies up their table with a grin. When next he looks, they’re back, flushed and out of breath, and he can hear their pleased exclamations when they notice the freshly made round of drinks sitting on their table.  

(He might have slipped a sprig of mint into the blonde princess’s ginger ale. Maybe. And he might notice her twirling it between her fingers with a little smile when he drops off a couple beers at the table next to hers. It can’t hurt to make a good impression on her this time, right? He’d been kicking himself ever since Halloween and the best sex of his life for not getting her number, or at least her fucking _name_ , but now it seems like he’s gotten a second chance.

So, of course, as soon as he comes back from taking his break later that night, they’ve left for good. He mutters curses under his breath while disappointment washes over him at the sight of the empty barstool where the blonde had once been.

Miller had been covering his section for his fifteen minutes, and as he passes him with a tray of soft pretzels and gourmet dips, Miller frowns and says, “Why are you looking so down? They left you a good tip.”

“I’m fine,” Bellamy says, his eyes on their empty table. “Just have a headache.”

Once he’s back behind the bar, he tries to ignore the headache quickly reasserting itself by busily wiping down the counter. Eventually he has to admit it’s probably cleaner than it’s ever been before, and he turns to toss his rag in the bin. A glimmer of something catches his eye then, and he takes a closer look at the little lost and found tub that lives next to the bar rags. Nestled in with a baseball cap, four pairs of sunglasses, a couple tubes of lipstick, and a bra is the sparkling tiara, the one she had worn so precisely in her golden hair all evening.

“Princess lost her crown,” he says to himself, and though he’s not sure why this little thing should matter so much to him, he can’t help the grin that spreads across his face.

* * *

Throughout the next week, Bellamy finds himself remembering things about her that he doesn’t even remember _noticing_ in the first place. The strawberry daiquiri he makes for a twenty-five-year-old’s birthday drink is the same color as the flowy top she was wearing for her friend’s bachelorette night. Another woman’s earrings remind him of the pretty little stones she’d worn on her ears. He even finds himself thinking about how the counter of the bar, when it’s all clean and shiny black before they open, reminds him of the polish on her nails while she twirled that sprig of mint.

That’s why when he turns around from pulling a pint to see her and her dark-haired friend sliding into seats at the bar, _right_ in front of him, the words slip out of his mouth without him meaning them to.

“So, the princess is back to retrieve her glass slipper,” he says, and then feels like the world’s biggest idiot when she gives him a puzzled, almost anxious look. Her friend–– _Raven,_ he reminds himself––just purses her lips at him.

“I’m sorry?” the blonde says.

“Oh, uh,” he says. “Your crown. You left your crown last time.”

Her cheeks grow a little pink, and he’s relieved when a little laugh leaves her lips. Raven snorts. Bellamy holds up a finger, then retrieves the tiara.

“Here you go, princess,” he says, handing it over the bar. “Wouldn’t want you to miss it any longer.”

“I’m no princess,” she retorts, but tucks the crown into her purse.

“As you wish, your highness,” he teases. “What can I get you two tonight?”

“The same as last time,” Raven tells him, eyebrows raised in challenge.

“Alright,” he says. “Paloma for Raven, ginger ale for the princess?”

“Ginger ale for Clarke,” the blonde corrects. “Not the princess. Just Clarke.”

Bellamy smiles at her while he starts grabbing the ingredients. “Sure thing, just Clarke.” He’s got the name now. All that’s left is the number.

He chats lightly with them, though Raven takes over most of the conversation while Clarke listens quietly, hands fidgeting with each other. He learns that their bachelorette friend got married two days ago, that they were all friends from college, that in the three years since graduating they all lived together until Monroe got engaged, but somehow he ends up telling them even more about himself: how long he’s worked at Grounders, that he just finished his Master’s degree in Classics, that he has a sister who works as a fourth-grade teacher… Bellamy’s a little shocked by how much the woman’s dragged out of him in the time it takes her and Clarke to finish their first drinks.

“So,” he says, suddenly feeling a little uncomfortable after Raven’s intense scrutiny. “I see you’re stuck being DD again, princess?” Bellamy slides a new ginger ale over to her.

Raven rolls her eyes, which confuses him a little, and Clarke just wrinkles her nose at him. When (thank _god_ ) Raven picks up her drink, squeezes Clarke’s shoulder, and starts heading with purpose toward that night’s DJ––Wick, Bellamy remembers––Bellamy leans forward and folds his arms on top of the bar.

“ _Clarke_ ,” she repeats. “And I’m stuck being DD for the foreseeable future.”

“Why are you DD this particular night?” he asks.

Clarke rolls her eyes. “Raven’s had a thing for the DJ since she met him on Halloween,” she says. “So she likes to go out wherever he’s working. But then when she’s actually there? She likes to hide her interest behind impossible song requests.”

“Really?” Bellamy says with a grin; then he starts to laugh when the music abruptly segues into Adele’s “Someone Like You.” He’d never thought of it as a song that encouraged dancing, but somehow Wick quickly spins it into a club-appropriate rhythm.

Clarke grins back at him. “Really.”

He has to leave her sometimes; he’s covering most of the bar by himself tonight, because Miller’s out sick with the flu, but somehow he always finds himself back in front of Clarke. She doesn’t seem in a dancing mood, not like Raven who has managed to drag Wick onto the dance floor during the man’s break. So they chat most of the night, and impossibly Bellamy finds himself liking this little blonde woman more than he thought he could, having only met her the three times now.

It’s late in the evening when Clarke reaches out, puts a hand on his wrist while he’s muddling some mint.

“Yeah?” he asks, taking in the way she’s biting her lip, the flush rising in her cheeks.

“I just,” Clarke starts. “I, um, wanted to know if we could. Talk. Sometime.”

“I’d like that,” he says, smiling at her. She smiles back, and it’s utterly adorable how relieved she seems at his response.

He pulls his phone out of his pocket and unlocks it before passing it to her.

“Program your number in, will you?” he asks.

She quickly types in her contact information, and her fingers brush his as she hands it back. Bellamy tries to pretend it doesn’t send shivers down his spine, because it was just her _fingers,_ and it’s honestly kind of embarrassing that her fingers can inspire that kind of response in him.

He texts her a quick _hey princess_ so she has his number too, and he notices her full name is Clarke Griffin.

“My last name’s Blake,” he tells her. It just seems fair.

Clarke smiles at him faintly, and holds out a hand. Highly amused, he takes her hand in his and they shake.

“Nice to finally meet you, Bellamy Blake.”

Shortly after that, a buzzed Raven sidles back to the bar and tugs at Clarke’s arm. Bellamy’s preoccupied at the moment––Connor managed to drop an entire tub of dirty dishes, and there’s shattered glass all the way from the bar to the dance floor. When the mess is finally cleaned up, and he turns back to the bar, Clarke’s seat is empty, and a stack of bills is tucked under her half-full ginger ale.

Bellamy sighs. What is it with this girl and her Cinderella act?

But the weight of his phone in his pocket, and the knowledge that he’s got her number programmed into it are enough to give him a funny warm feeling in spite of the fact that this is the third time she’s disappeared on him.

* * *

The next day is his day off, which means Bellamy’s not doing much except for puttering around his apartment, doing laundry and washing dishes, when Clarke texts him.  

He didn’t really expect to hear from her so soon, and had been debating whether or not to send her the first text, so he’s pleasantly surprised to open the message and see her request that they get together.

He quickly replies in the affirmative, and in just another moment she texts him an address.

Huh.

Bellamy raises a brow at the address––he recognizes the street name, because it’s in the same residential area as the school where Octavia works.

Clarke wants him to meet her at her _house_?

He’s struck with the instant memory of her hot sighs in his ear, the way she was wet and tight around him while he fucked her against the storage room door––

Well, Bellamy hadn’t expected this quite so soon, but it’s Clarke––he’s not about to decline the invitation.

So he quickly gets ready––shaves, brushes his teeth, puts on deodorant, makes sure his shirt isn’t stained or anything––then heads to his car.

When he finds her house, it’s a little strange to realize he drives past it all the time, whenever he goes to meet O for lunch. It’s blue and brick and small, but not tiny, and the lawn is plain, tidy grass. He doesn’t see a car in her driveway, but figures she must be parked inside the attached garage. All in all, it’s a _lot_ nicer than his apartment.

But not so nice he wants to turn around and pretend he never found it, he tells himself.

He can handle it.

She probably rents it, anyway. That’s not so bad.

“You have a goddamned Master’s degree, Blake,” he mutters to himself, and forces himself out of the car. “Get your shit together.”

He jogs up to the front door, notices the stupidly cute welcome mat Clarke has, decorated all over with different colored skeleton keys, shoves a hand through his hair, and knocks.

She opens the door almost immediately, and he can't say he expected to see her with her hair up in a sloppy bun, face washed clean, wearing leggings and an old oversized college sweatshirt––UCLA, really?––but he also can't say he minds it. She looks pretty damn adorable, bare feet and all.

“Hey,” he greets her with a smile. She smiles back, and he thinks she looks pretty nervous for being the one to text _him,_ so when she steps to side and holds the door open he casts around for something to say that could set her mind at ease.

“I like your house,” he says, wincing when he realizes how lame he sounds. “I mean, it’s nice. And it’s a nice neighborhood.”

“Oh,” says Clarke, shutting the door. “Um, thanks.”

They’re left standing in her entryway, and as much as Bellamy is interested in her things, the painting hanging on the wall, the little table holding an odd bowl that looks like it's been welded together from several different metals, the soothing green of the paint, he’s not quite sure what’s going on––nothing about this meeting so far is going like he expected when he got her text to come over.

“Can I get you something to drink?” she asks suddenly, and he can tell she’s biting the inside of her cheek. “I’ve got water, ginger ale, sprite…?”

“I’m fine, princess. You want to give me a tour or something?”

“Um, yeah. In a bit,” Clarke says. “I’m going to grab a drink––why don’t you meet me in the living room?” She points to their right and then escapes the other way into the kitchen. With a furrowed brow, Bellamy wanders into the bright living room. There’s more art on the walls, similar in style to the one hanging in her entryway, and her sectional couch looks a hell of a lot more comfortable and expensive than his own piece of Ikea crap. There are at least half a dozen throw pillows on the thing––what is it with women and throw pillows, he wonders. His own sister has always had at least three extra pillows on her bed. Yeah, yeah, they’re _accents_ , for _decoration_ , but Bellamy doesn’t really see the appeal.

He’s just sat down on the damned comfortable couch when Clarke shuffles into the room, a glass filled with the familiar gold of ginger ale in her hands. He thinks she looks a little pale as she sips.

“You okay?” he asks. “You want to sit down?” He pats the cushions next to him, but she’s already shaking her head.

“No,” she says. “But thanks. I think I need to stand.”

Bellamy has the strange feeling that whatever he _thought_ was going to happen today when Clarke texted him is dead wrong.

“Alright,” he says slowly, the hands resting on his knees slowly curling into fists.

She starts to pace back and forth, and even from across the room he can tell that she’s chewing the inside of her cheek again.

“Oh god,” she sighs suddenly. “ _God._ Alright, I’ll just talk, okay?”

She doesn’t seem to need his response, so he just listens silently while she pep talks herself.

“We never told each other our names,” she finally says in a rush. “And I didn’t have your number. I had no _clue_ how to find you, alright? I tried asking at the club but all they said was how the hell would they remember? It was fucking Halloween, it was _packed_ , it was my own damn fault. Assholes,” she adds with a sneer, and in the back of his puzzled mind Bellamy can’t help but note that she looks hot as hell even now.

“And then I saw you at Monroe’s bachelorette party,” she continues. “And I didn’t know what to do, or say, and I kind of just panicked. And then after I’d left, I realized how shitty that was, and that I _had_ to talk to you, and so Raven and I went back last night, and she scoped you out for me, and god that sounds bad, and I’m sorry, but I _needed_ to know at least a little what kind of person you are before I––before I––”

Her hands are trembling so much that the soda is nearly spilling over the edge of the glass, and even though Bellamy’s absolutely confused about what the hell Clarke is saying, he hurriedly stands and crosses to her side.

“Hey, hey, it’s okay,” he says, pulling the glass out of her hand and setting in on an end table, then hesitantly grabbing her shoulders. “Clarke, calm down.”

She sucks in a huge breath, and then looks at him with an attempted smile that’s more of a grimace.

“Maybe you should sit,” he says, concerned; her color is even worse now than it was when she came into the living room.

But she shakes her head. “No. But you might want to.”

He frowns at her, crosses his arms over his chest.

“Okay, what the hell is going on with you, Clarke?” he asks. “You’ve been babbling for ages and still haven’t said a thing.”

“What the hell is going on with me?” she echoes quietly, and then the way her eyes narrow at him make him want to scramble for an apology immediately. But she’s already talking again.

“I’ll tell you what’s wrong with me, Bellamy Blake,” she bites out. “I’ll fucking _show_ you what’s wrong with me.” With that, she drags her sweatshirt up over her head and tosses it to the ground.

All she has on under that is one of those tight, stretchy tank tops his sister always layers under everything, and now as he looks at her he realizes that every time he saw her in the bar, she was always seated at a table or hidden by the crowd. And both nights at Grounders she wore those flowy tops that are popular right now. Because, he realizes, if he had seen her more closely, or dressed in something else, he would have realized why she was apparently always the designated driver for her friends.

The answer is there in plain sight for him to see, a small but obvious swell of her abdomen.

“Shit,” he says dumbly.

“Yeah,” Clarke says. “Shit.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bellamy can be such a guy sometimes. And apparently I have a thing for Modern!Bellamy working at a bar called Grounders. ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯ Don't worry, when we get back to Clarke a lot of the last three months will be filled in for you! Let me know your thoughts!


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The next couple of months are not great for Clarke.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're going back and filling in the time gap! To be clear, this chapter starts just after Clarke finds out she's pregnant, and it follows her up until she encounters Bellamy again. 
> 
> By chapter four, our alternating POV situation will be chronologically in sync, so there will be no more of this time-jumping. Yay!

Though they could have been worse, the next couple of months are not great for Clarke.

 

First, she goes straight back to Mount Weather. The manager she talks to outright _laughs_ at her when she asks if they have any way of tracking down one of the partygoers from Halloween; then he tells her she’d have better luck calling a random number out of the local phone book.

Clarke wracks her mind for any details about him that could help her track down the father of her unborn baby. It’s not that she needs his help, or even wants it––but it seems wrong to not at least _try_ to _tell_ him about it.

It’s never turned out well when people have kept secrets from her.

He was dressed as a pirate, and it seemed like the store-bought kind of costume, but all of the costume stores are seasonal except for _Evangeline’s_ , the novelty store in the historic district, and they’re closed by now. She calls _Evangeline’s_ just in case something will go miraculously right, but even if he _had_ picked up his outfit there, they tell her they don’t keep the kind of records with names and details.

He was dark-haired and dark-eyed, and his freckles made her want to paint stories to go with the constellations they made on his skin, and his hands were strong, and the movements of his hips were absurdly skilled, and she had never wanted someone quite as much as she had wanted him that night. But none of that can help Clarke now.

There are nearly half a million people in the city proper, and over two million in the greater metropolitan area, and Clarke doesn’t have the faintest idea where to go from here.

So, she doesn’t go anywhere. She gives up on finding him, buys half a dozen pregnancy books, and tries to bury the slow seeping guilt under hazy dreams about babies with her eyes and his freckles.

* * *

Next, Clarke tells her friends at their annual Christmas party. Now that Monroe’s engaged to John Murphy and they have a nice new apartment downtown, the couple insists on doing the hosting this year instead of Clarke. Well, Monroe insists. Murphy usually goes along with whatever Monroe says.

It’s always a cheerfully drunken affair, and this time is no different. Clarke’s queasy enough that day to bring along her own bottle of ginger ale in her purse, especially since it’s highly unlikely that there’s anything nonalcoholic in Monroe’s apartment. Her morning sickness isn’t awful, not yet, and she’s learned that sipping on some soda usually calms her stomach enough to be able to function.

“Clarke!” Monroe exclaims when she opens the door. “Raven! It’s been ages!” Clarke laughs as Monroe lurches forward, draping herself over both of them in a tipsy embrace.

“Home’s not the same without you, Monroe,” Clarke replies, giving the other woman a quick squeeze.

“Yeah, yeah, same,” Raven says with a roll of her eyes that’s belied by the firm hug she gives in return. “Murphy! Get your ass out here and stop your fianceé from assaulting us!”

“Keep your panties on,” he says in a surly voice as he emerges from the hallway. He loops an arm around Monroe’s waist and lifts her easily away from them, plopping her back down at his side. “I had to put out more booze because _someone_ already drank half the eggnog.”

“It was Sterling,” Monroe says solemnly as she leans into him. “He has a problem.”

“Right,” Raven says dryly. “Sterling.”

They all trickle into the living room, where some others are already drinking and swaying to the Christmas music playing in the background. The aforementioned Sterling is there, talking animatedly to a dark-haired girl Clarke thinks is named Elle. Shell? No, Mel, that’s it. She doesn’t know a lot of the others very well, but they’re regular attendees of the Christmas party.

“What do you want to drink?” Monroe asks brightly, still leaning against Murphy. “We’ve got _lots_ of options.”

“Uh,” Clarke says, and decides not to mention the ginger ale stashed in her bag unless she has to. “Is there any unspiked eggnog?”

Murphy raises an eyebrow and Monroe frowns. “It’s got bourbon, Clarke,” she says reproachfully. “Your favorite.”

Bourbon’s not her favorite, but Clarke’s never won an argument with a drunken Monroe ever, so she just smiles. “Thanks, but I’d rather wait on the booze.”

Murphy disentangles himself from Monroe and disappears into the kitchen. Raven tries to distract Monroe with a request for a cranberry vodka, and a moment later he returns with a little cup of eggnog.

“Last of the pure stuff,” he tells Clarke as he hands her the glass.

“Great,” she says, and goes to take a little sip. Before the glass can even touch her lips, Monroe interrupts.

“Clarke, it’s _Christmas._ We always get drunk on eggnog together. It’s _tradition._ ”

“Babe––” Murphy tries to calm Monroe out of her belligerence, but Clarke shakes her head. She’s kept it quiet until now, just between herself and Raven, as she adjusts to all of the rules and regulations that come along with a fetus. But there’s no way Monroe’s going to let it go.

“Well. Since we’re all here, I guess I should tell everybody.”

“Now?” Raven asks.

Clarke shrugs helplessly. “If not now, when?”

“What are you talking about?” Monroe asks, frowning at the both of them.

Clarke takes a deep breath and then drinks a big swig of the eggnog, hoping that the familiar taste will trick her brain into thinking it’s liquid courage.

It doesn’t––instead, Clarke’s stomach turns over in one slow, revolting flop and she can barely manage to squeak out the words, “I’m pregnant,” before shoving the cup at Monroe and bolting for the bathroom.

She shuts and locks the door and then collapses in front the toilet, bringing the eggnog right back up. Then she dry-heaves for a few minutes, and then she waits a few minutes more until she’s relatively sure she’s not going to have a repeat experience.

Clarke groans and pulls herself up. She opens the medicine cabinet and pours herself some mint flavored mouthwash. She swishes it gingerly, but over the past couple of weeks she’s discovered that thankfully the mint is more soothing than unsettling to her stomach. Her reflection in the mirror is pale, especially against the cheerful red of her sweater, and her hair is escaping from its pins. She splashes a little water on her face and dries it on the hand towel, tidies her updo, then sighs and steps out to face her friends.

Murphy’s waiting in the hallway outside the bathroom, leaning up against the wall and staring at his feet when she finally comes out.

“You alright?” he asks when she pauses in the doorway, surprised to see him there instead of Raven or Monroe.

“I’m getting used to it,” she says. “It’s gross, but they say it ends. Eventually.”

He watches her seriously.

“Knocked up, huh?”

She nods. “Yup.”

“You want me to end the guy who did this to you?” he asks her, his hands stuffed in his pockets.

“Murphy,” she says in a warning tone.

“In a non-criminal way,” he adds reluctantly.

Clarkes sighs, but she doesn’t really mind. John Murphy can be a little strange sometimes, but he’s funny and oddly charming and fiercely loyal once he decides he likes you.

“I appreciate the sentiment,” she finally responds with a little smile. “But I’d have to be able to tell you who the guy is.”

Murphy raises an eyebrow. “You don’t know?”

She grimaces. “Not exactly.”

He doesn’t say anything, but grips her shoulder gently before gesturing for her to precede him down the hall.

The rest of the night isn’t too bad. Monroe is overly affectionate but sweet with Clarke’s still-flat belly, and Clarke has to talk in circles to avoid discussing the conception in detail with the people she's not close friends with. But Raven doesn’t leave her side and Murphy keeps her plate full of tasteless water crackers and her cup topped off with ginger ale.

* * *

After that, her morning sickness comes on so violently it’s a wonder she manages to gain any weight at all. She mostly lives on ginger ale, pretzels, and apple-flavored jello for a solid three and a half weeks when it’s at its worst.

But she does gain weight, enough to keep Dr. Nyko happy, and it’s with a lot of grumbling that Clarke trades out her favorite winter jeans for stretchy black leggings and oversized sweaters. She can still fit into the jeans if she really tries, but they’re tight and she’s already uncomfortable enough that she doesn’t even bother. Clarke’s at least grateful that it’s nearly impossible to feel cold since she got pregnant, because this is the first winter she’s spent totally warm since she moved north from Los Angeles.

“You look like a total hipster,” Monroe tells her when she brings Clarke a hot apple cider from The Dripship one cold afternoon.

Monroe had insisted that they do a movie day that weekend while Murphy’s busy at the restaurant and Raven’s stuck in a conference all day long; even though Clarke had protested feebly that Monroe should be using the time to finalize details for the wedding, she’s grateful for the company.

“One, I take that as a compliment,” Clarke snarks, sipping gingerly at the drink. Her stomach seems to accept it, so she takes another sip. “Two, take a look at your hair––do you really want to play this game?”

Monroe automatically brings a hand to the crown of braids she’s woven her hair into today.

“You’re just jealous,” she says.

“Irrelevant,” Clarke replies, and they both flop onto the couch.

“Okay, I brought a bunch of different options,” Monroe announces, hauling her massive purse into her lap. “ _The Back-up Plan._ Um, _The Pregnancy Pact_ ––but if we watch that one, please let it be known that just because you got knocked up does _not_ mean I’m in any hurry to join the club. Ooh, speaking of which, _Knocked Up._ ”

Clarke stares at the growing pile of movies Monroe is stacking in her lap.

“Are you serious?” she asks. “Did you actually rent every single movie about pregnancy you could find?”

“Oh, no,” Monroe says, adding the first season of _Raising Hope_ to the stack. “We already owned all of these.”

Clarke frowns. “I don’t remember you having all of these when you lived here.”

Monroe shrugs. “Well, I’ve gotten some new ones since then. And some are John’s.”

“Some of _these_ are Murphy’s?” she asks, grateful she had swallowed her last sip of cider before Monroe spoke.

“He used to work at Blockbuster, remember? Before they went the way of the dinosaur. He got a crapton of free movies when the stores closed.”

“And they included a bunch of baby-themed rom coms?” Clarke says skeptically.

Monroe hands her _Juno._ “There’s nothing wrong with wanting to watch movies that’ll make you feel joy,” she says serenely. “He has a huge selection of all kinds of genres.”

“Mmhmm,” Clarke says. Then, quietly, she says, “Can we watch _Juno_?”

“Oh, thank god,” Monroe says, tossing her bag to the floor and taking the DVD from Clarke. “I was going to orphan your child if you insisted on watching _The Pregnancy Pact_.”

“You’d have to wait a while,” Clarke says. “It’s the size of a peach right now.”

She may or may not have started following a website that compares the size of the baby to a different object for each week of pregnancy. Last week it was a plum; at thirteen weeks, the baby’s a peach.

“I’m a very patient woman,” Monroe replies.

* * *

And then, a couple of weeks later, they go out for Monroe’s bachelorette party.

It’s just the three of them, but the wedding is going to be small too, and it’s been the three of them together ever since they were assigned to a triple dorm room at UCLA.

 

When three eighteen-year-old girls share a single tiny room for nine months, they either learn to love each other or they start World War III.

After an explosive first month that involved Monroe threatening Clarke with a water pistol, and Clarke finding out that the guy she’d drunkenly made out with at her first college party was Raven’s long-time boyfriend (not that he introduced himself, even though _he_ had been sober and she’d babbled on about her two roommates), and Raven claiming she _would_ build a bomb out of Monroe’s laptop if she didn’t stop leaving her wet towels all over the ground––well, after all that, there was an awkward moment when Clarke and Monroe walked in on Raven crying after she broke up with her asshole boyfriend. Clarke dug her emergency stash of double-stuf oreos out of her desk drawer, and Monroe found her half-empty jar of Skippy peanut butter, and they sat in a circle eating peanut butter and cookies and reading through the Ex Jokes feed on pinterest.

(It’s hard not to like each other after peanut butter and oreos and Ex Jokes on pinterest.)

 

Murphy drops Monroe off at Clarke’s house early in the evening, and they complete the time-honored ritual of getting ready to go out together. In between Raven and Monroe’s first and second drinks, Raven produces a trio of silly plastic tiaras from her bedroom.

“Really?” Clarke asks as Monroe snorts and tries to position the bachelorette crown. “ _Really_?”

“Shut up,” Raven tells her. “This is going to be awesome.”

“It’s my party,” Monroe announces, “and you’ll wear a tiara if I want you to.”

Clarke opens her mouth, but Monroe cuts her off, adding, “And I want you to. Put that tiara on, Griffin!”

“Alright, Mrs. Murphy, alright,” she says, and slides it into her hair.

“That sounds like a character from a kid’s book,” Raven says, and takes a huge gulp of her drink. “Mrs. Monroe Murphy.”

Monroe shrugs. “And that, ladies, is why I’m sticking with Monroe Stuart. If we ever have any spawn, _they_ can be Murphys.”

Clarke pauses in the middle of swiping on her lipstick. Her child is only going to have the one option.

 _God_ , she’s not looking forward to explaining to a child why she doesn’t even know the father’s last name.

She wrinkles her nose at her reflection, finishes up with the lipstick, and stows it in her clutch.

“You two ready to go?” she asks.

“Hell yeah!” Monroe cheers, and futilely tries to right the tiara that’s already sliding to the side.

“Raven, you said you found us someplace new to go?”

Raven nods and adjusts her top until her breasts are displayed to her satisfaction.

“Yeah, Grounders. It’s not new––it’s been around for years––but I’ve never gone in because the outside looks like a dive. But Kyle said it’s really cool inside. Kind of vintage meets grunge, I guess? And he said there’s a great bar and the dance floor’s always packed. And I told him that if it blows, I’ll kick his ass, and he swears it’s going to be great.”

“Sounds good to me,” Clarke says.

 

The bar _is_ really cool; they use those neat Edison bulbs in their lights, and the walls are exposed brick, but the bar is a slick black and the differently colored stools are scratched and dinged.  

Even though it’s relatively early for a Saturday night, there’s a huge crowd on the dance floor. Clarke _hates_ dancing when there are only a couple people scattered awkwardly over a massive space, especially when she’s not allowed to use alcohol to dim the embarrassment, but it doesn’t look like it’s going to be problem here.

Raven cuts off the couple that’s heading for the one empty bar table with a lethal glare, then gestures with a dramatic flourish.

“My ladies,” she says, snickering, “Your table awaits.”

Clarke snorts, and Monroe bursts into giggles as they climb up on their stools. Monroe and Raven are both already two _very_ strong homemade drinks in, and Clarke is contemplating forcing them to put some food in their stomachs, when she hears a deep voice.

“Good evening, ladies. What can I get for you all?”

Clarke glances over with a little smile, and her mouth drops open.

_Oh. My. God._

He’s in a dark tee, not a silly pirate shirt, and jeans instead of laced-up breeches; his face is clean and his freckles are heart-stopping and he’s _standing right in front of her._

* * *

It’s clear that Raven doesn’t remember enough about her glimpse of him at Mount Weather to recognize the man, so for the rest of the night Clarke forces thoughts of him from her mind, determined not to ruin Monroe’s bachelorette night with her ridiculous baby drama. Besides, now she knows where he works, and that his name is Bellamy, and that there’s no way in hell she’s going to lose track of him this time.

Only late that night, when they’ve all gone back to the house and are lying all tangled up with blankets and pillows on the living room floor, does Clarke bring it up.

“What did you guys think of Grounders?” she asks, staring up the ceiling and tapping her fingers gently on the little rise of her belly.

“I _loved_ it,” Monroe says, flinging an arm in the air for emphasis. “Good job, Raven’s boyfriend.”

“He’s not my boyfriend,” Raven mumbles.

“Sorry, _man_ friend,” Monroe says.

“He’s not––” Raven pauses. “Well. He’s all man.”

They all burst out laughing, and when the giggles finally subside Clarke takes in a deep breath.

“You remember the bartender?”

“Uh, _yeah_ ,” Raven says. “Hottie McHotterson.”

“Yum,” Monroe adds.

“Um.” Clarke bites her lip, then says in a rush, “He’s the guy from Mount Weather.”

There’s a beat of silence.

“Wait, _what_?” Raven demands.

Both of her friends pop into her line of vision, leaning over her with matching scowls while she tries not to look away from the ceiling.

“Guy-from-Mount-Weather who _impregnated_ you? That Mount Weather guy?” Monroe asks.

“Yes,” Clarke says in a tiny voice.

“Shit, Clarke, why didn’t you say anything when we were there?” Raven says.

Clarke groans and closes her eyes. “Lots of reasons! We were having fun. I didn’t want to ruin Monroe’s night. You probably would have freaked out on him, and I was having enough trouble not freaking _myself_ out. Take your pick.”

They both sigh, and then there’s a lot of rustling as they lie down next to her.

“You wouldn’t have ruined anything,” Monroe says quietly.

“And I could have controlled myself,” Raven adds. “Well, probably.”

“No, it’s better this way,” Clarke says. “I know where to find him now.”

Oh god. She knows where to find him now.

“I guess…I guess I need to figure out how to tell him,” Clarke adds, and to her horror her voice wobbles a little and her nose starts to burn.

“Clarke?” Raven asks, tone concerned; Clarke can feel Monroe stroke her arm.

“What if––what if he’s not a good person?” she says, sniffling. “The only thing I know about him is that he’s a bartender! I don’t want––I don’t want him to be around my baby if he’s a bad person.”

“You don’t have to let him be around if he’s a bad person,” Monroe says. “You don’t need his help, anyway. You’ve got this; you’ve got _us._ ”

“You don’t even have to tell him,” Raven reminds her gently.

“But I _should_ , or _I’m_ the bad person!” Clarke exclaims, and rolls away from them so she can get up and get a tissue for her stupid running nose and weepy eyes.

“Clarke, you need to calm down,” Raven says, sitting up and watching her. “It’ll be okay.”

“How do you know?” she says, and blows her nose loudly.

“Because Raven will scope him out for you,” Monroe says. “You know she’s good at getting guys to talk.”

“I _am_ good,” Raven agrees.

Clarke grabs another tissue and wipes under her eyes.

“And then you can decide what to do,” Monroe continues. “If he’s a decent guy, tell him. If he’s not, we’ll never go to Grounders again, and that’ll be that.”

“Yeah,” Clarke says. “Yeah, okay.”

“You two should go next weekend,” Monroe says, flopping back down on the ground now that Clarke’s calmed down. “I’m swamped at the firm through Wednesday, and then there’s the wedding.”

“We could wait for you,” Clarke offers. “You and Murphy’ll only be gone a couple weeks.”

“Clarke.”

“What?” she says defensively. She plops down between Raven and Monroe and rolls herself back up in a blanket.

Monroe turns on her side to look at her. “Trust me, I’d _love_ to see this whole thing go down. But don’t you kind of think time is of the essence?”

“I don’t know what you mean,” she says stubbornly.

Raven reaches over and pokes her carefully in the stomach.

“Hey!”

“Griffin, you’re a ticking time bomb,” Raven says.

Clarke wrinkles her nose, then sighs.

“ _God,_ I know.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the pretty much entire lack of Bellamy in this one, BUT his POV is up next and we should be firmly in normal time from here on out! No having to jump around! So there'll be plenty of time for Bellamy/Clarke interaction in chapter four and onward. 
> 
> Hopefully our favorite sassbucket BFFs and everybody's favorite trash king made this chapter worth it! Let me know what you thought!


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bellamy gets emotional about avocados.

“I’m going to sit down now,” Bellamy announces, and falls onto the couch.

Clarke looks a little contrite, as if she hadn’t just been cussing him out, and she hesitantly sits a good few feet away from him on the sofa.

“I’m sorry,” she says after a few quiet moments of him just staring at her. “I meant to say it better.”

She’s tapping on her belly with one hand, but he’s not really sure if she realizes that she’s doing it because at the same time she’s searching his face earnestly.

Bellamy swallows hard.

“This.” He waves vaguely at her midsection, and she glances down at herself. “This is from Halloween?”

“Yes,” she says.

“From me?” he clarifies, and she narrows her eyes.

“Yes,” she says.

“You’re sure?” he asks.

“ _Yes_ ,” she hisses. “There was, ah, an unforeseen complication with my birth control.”

“Obviously,” he says, and she stands up.

“I need to use the bathroom,” she says flatly. “I’ll be back in a minute.”

She sails out of the living room, back ramrod straight, and Bellamy’s left to gaze at where she had been.

“What the _fuck_ ,” he whispers. Fuck, fuck, _fuck._

His chest feels tight, and he hunches forward until he’s resting his elbows on his knees.

“Oh god,” he breathes slowly, burying his face in his hands.

His thoughts feel like they’re moving through sludge––he’s just stuck on that one thing, that sight of Clarke, tapping on her rounded stomach with an anxious look on her face, the pregnant belly that _he’s_ responsible for, because holy _shit_ he got a girl _pregnant,_ and Clarke is having a _baby_ and it’s _his._

There’s going to be a _baby._

Bellamy hasn’t been around a baby since Octavia was born.

What if he’s forgotten how they work? What if he fucks up and messes the baby up? What if it’s a boy? He has no idea how to raise a boy. What if it turns out just like him? What if it’s a boy and he fucks up and raises a baby that grows into a man who knocks girls up on Halloween? _Fuck_ his _life._

But what if it’s a girl? He didn’t do _everything_ by himself with Octavia; his mom was around until Octavia was sixteen, and after that point all he had to do was keep the two of them housed and fed. What if it’s a girl and he has no idea what to do because he’s basically starting from scratch?

There’s going to be a _baby_ , and shit, he’s probably going to fuck this up so bad.

He hears Clarke’s footsteps return to the living room and glances up at her. She’s standing in the doorway, bracing one hand against the jamb and tapping her belly with the other, a fiercely determined look on her face. Before he can say anything–– _holy shit_ ,  _you’re pregnant, I’m sorry, what can I do, how do you want to do this?_ ––she immediately launches into a long and seemingly-rehearsed spiel.

“Okay, here’s the deal,” she says, “I planned on doing this by myself. You seemed like a decent guy last night, so I thought you should know about the baby. It’s yours, but if you don’t believe me you’re going to have to wait until July for a paternity test, because I have no intention of undergoing unnecessary medical tests right now. But I’d appreciate it if you’d tell me your medical history and anything that runs in your family. Other than that, I expect nothing from you.”

The longer she talks, the more he straightens up, and when she delivers her final announcement he abruptly stands. Some part of him tries to warn him that he should calm down, that getting angry and yelling is the opposite of helpful in this moment, but Bellamy’s too goddamned furious to see straight, let alone pay attention to helpful instincts.

“Yeah? Well, I’ve got news for you, princess,” he sneers. “You’re not going to fucking tell me you’re fucking _pregnant_ and then kick my ass to the curb, alright? I’m not some goddamned chump you can fuck around with and then dump because I don’t fit in with your pretty picture of the future. That’s not how this is going to fucking work.”

Bellamy suddenly realizes that he’s standing right in front of Clarke, having crossed the room during his rant, and she’s looking up at him with wide, wide blue eyes.

Even as he moves to take a step back, give her a little personal space, and opens his mouth to offer a stiff apology, her eyes grow glassy.

The sight is like a bucket of icy water dousing his temper completely.

“Wait,” Bellamy panics, “Wait, shit, I’m sorry.”

But when she closes her eyes tightly, tears spill out and streak down her cheeks. A tiny whimper escapes her mouth, and it’s not the good kind Bellamy remembers from Mount Weather; it’s the _he’s-already-fucked-this-up-and-made-the-mother-of-his-unborn-child-cry_ kind of whimper.  

He reaches out hesitantly, cupping one hand around her shoulder, and she lets out a strangled sob and pulls away from his touch. Bellamy’s never felt like such lowlife scum as when Clarke shrinks away from him, and then skirts around him to get to the couch.

She curls up into the deep corner of the sectional, grabbing the biggest throw pillow and pulling it into her lap so she can hide her face in it while she cries. It’s his turn to carefully sit down a few feet away from her, gut twisting and turning with guilt, as he waits for her to acknowledge him again.

“I’m sorry,” she says suddenly, face still buried in the pillow. “I shouldn’t have said those things like that.”

“Hey,” Bellamy says gently, “No, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said _any_ of the things I said.”

“It’s just––” she pulls in a huge, shaky breath, and peeks up at him. He hates himself a little more when he sees her swollen eyes, pink nose. “It’s just that I’d convinced myself I was never going to––going to find you, and that I was going to have to do this on my own, and I was mostly okay with that, but then I _did_ find you. And suddenly I was terrified, because I don’t even _know_ you, but I had to tell you, or else I’m a terrible person and this kid will turn out as a serial killer or something because it has such an awful parent, but I’m doing the best that I can and I’m sorry if I was rude but I’m–I’m scared, and I’m tired, and I’m hungry, and–and–I’ve been craving avocados, but the baby’s the size of an avocado this week and I’m too freaked out to eat them!”

She hiccups and looks at him miserably.

“It’s the size of an avocado?” he echoes stupidly, imagining a tiny, perfectly formed infant small enough for him to cradle in one hand. His chest feels tight again, but in a different kind of way.

She nods. “It was an orange last week,” she sniffs.

“Oh,” he says.

“So,” Clarke says quietly after a few moments.

“Yeah?” he asks.

“I–I guess I need to know what you want,” she says. “I didn’t––I didn’t mean it badly, earlier. I can do this by myself. I was _going_ to do this by myself, and you didn’t have any say in what I’ve done so far about the baby. But if you––if you _want_ to do this too, I’m not going to stop you.”

He knows he should take some time to think about it, about what a baby really means for his life, for his family and for his future when he’s _just_ started getting his shit together after finishing school, but this baby is _his_ too, and it’s impossible to think of any other conclusion than looking Clarke in the eye and saying, “I want in.”

She swallows hard and doesn’t look away from his face.

“You don’t have to tell me now,” she says. “Even I got to take some time to decide what I was going to do. I don’t want you to tell me you’re sure if you’re not.”

“I’m sure,” he says firmly, immediately. “I’m not going to let you do this alone.”

* * *

They make tentative plans to meet up again next weekend to talk more, and Clarke tells him that he can come to her next prenatal appointment, if he wants, in a few weeks.

“It’s the good one,” she says, a timid smile on her face. “Twenty weeks means we can probably learn the sex.” Then she looks a little concerned. “Unless you don’t want to know,” she says. “I didn’t plan on keeping it a surprise, but if you really don’t want to…?”

He shakes his head. “Uh, no,” he says. “Knowing is good.”

Bellamy only has so long to get as prepared as he possibly can, and another surprise––even just about the baby’s sex––doesn’t sound very appealing.

Clarke is looking tired, so he makes some excuse to leave so she can rest. At the door, there’s an awkward moment when neither of them know how to say goodbye. After a brief hesitation, Clarke wraps her arms around him in a quick hug, and the way her belly presses against him for a second has his own stomach feeling all trembly. Bellamy hugs her in return, and she smells like soap and mint and lemons. He likes it, a lot, so he pulls away, not sure if it’s appropriate that he’s still this attracted to the woman he’s accidentally knocked up.

Fuck, that’s a whole different can of worms that he’s _not_ going to think about right now.

He heads home on autopilot, luckily avoiding hitting any other cars or pedestrians.

Bellamy lets himself into his apartment, shuts the door, and then stands in his entryway for a good five minutes.

“Okay,” he says. “Okay. She’s pregnant. Okay.”

A couple of seconds go by.

“ _Fuck_.”

Bellamy doesn’t really know what he’s supposed to do now. He stares blankly at his apartment. He’d moved into the one-bedroom when his sister had moved in with her fiancé, now husband. As he looks at it now, all he can see is how breakable so much of his stuff is. Old, heavy picture frames that belonged to his mother, a vase Octavia had given him for reasons he still isn’t sure of, his guitar hanging on its hook.

A kid would have a hell of a time not breaking anything in here, he thinks faintly, then feels ill when he thinks about the fact that a kid would have a hell of a time not _getting_ broken by any of the stuff in his apartment.

Bellamy pulls his phone out of his pocket and fumbles to unlock the screen. He hits the first number on his favorites list and listens anxiously as the phone rings.

“O?” he says. “I need you to come over and help me with some things.”

* * *

“What’s up, big brother?” Octavia says, sailing through the door. She stops dead in the entryway and raises an eyebrow when she sees him flat on his back on the floor, staring up.

“I don’t know where to start,” he says to the ceiling. He waves a wand in the direction of the sofa, where he started to pile the vase and the frames.

“Start with what?” she asks slowly.

“Getting everything ready,” he replies. “Getting _me_ ready. How do I even do that? Am I supposed to buy some kind of book?”

“Bell, what the hell are you talking about?” Octavia asks, moving to sit next to him on the floor.

“I––”

It’s hard to think the words, let alone say them aloud to his baby sister.

He clears his throat, and says instead, “You’re going to be an aunt.”

There’s a long, long moment of silence as he keeps staring at the ceiling.

Then, “ _Ow_!” He pushes himself into a sitting position, rubbing his shoulder where she socked him. “What the hell, O?”

She glares at him. “What the fuck’s wrong with you?” she asks, and hits him again. “That’s not how you say these kinds of things!”

“Jesus, Octavia, it’s not like I have experience with this kind of announcement,” he grumbles.

“Why haven’t I met her?” Octavia demands. “You’re having a baby with someone you haven’t even bothered to introduce me to yet? You got mad when I went on my first date with Lincoln without introducing the two of you, even though I was away at college!”

Bellamy’s eyes flick away from hers. Wow, has his carpet always been stained in that spot by the couch? Maybe he should look into getting the carpet shamp––

“Bellamy!”

“Ah,” he says. “We’re not––I mean, it was just––” He growls, and forces out the rest of the words. “It was a one time thing three months ago, and I only just found out.”

He glances at her out of the corner of his eye and tries not to cringe when he sees her Thinking Face.

“Oh my god,” she says suddenly. “Three months ago? _Halloween_?”

“Yes,” he admits quietly.

“The princess?” she says, and hits him yet again. “You didn’t tell me you fucked her!”

“Jesus, O!” he sputters. “Why the fuck would I _ever_ tell you that?”

“You went on and on about her enough that night,” she tells him. “And drunk-you was free enough with your description of her ‘sparkly-ass crown,’ and her ‘fancy princess dress,’ and how ‘fucking beautiful’ her hair was.”

He doesn’t remember that, but he has a sinking feeling that his sister’s telling the truth.

“Whatever,” he mutters. “It happened, I didn’t see her again until a week ago, she’s pregnant.”

Octavia sighs. “How’d this even happen?”

“She said she was on birth control,” Bellamy replies. “But I guess something went wrong with it.”

She frowns. “Bellamy,” she says hesitantly. “Are you…are you sure it’s yours?”

“I believe her,” he says.

“You barely know this woman,” Octavia reminds him. “And you’re already rearranging your life for her.” She gestures at the pile of breakables on his couch, waiting to be wrapped up. “You need to be sure this is _your_ deal, not some rando’s attempt to get a daddy for her kid.”

“Clarke doesn’t have any reason to lie about it,” he says. “She was already going to do this by herself, O. She just thought I should know.”

Octavia bites her lip. “I still think you should make _sure_ , Bell. This Clarke may seem nice, but you don’t really know her. And a kid is going to change your whole life.”

Bellamy grits his teeth and pushes himself up. “I’ll get a paternity test done when the kid’s born,” he says. “But I can’t wait until then to deal with this. Clarke says it’s mine, and I’ve got to deal with that .”

“I get that,” she tells him. “Just––just don’t put it off longer than you have to, okay?”

“I won't. Now,” he says. “Are you going to help me kid-proof this place, or what?”

Octavia rolls her eyes, but gives him a crooked smile when he helps her up from the floor.

Once his sister convinces him that a baby won’t be knocking picture frames off the wall anytime soon, and he’ll really only need to worry about his guitar and stuff like that when the kid starts crawling (“Bellamy, I work with kids all day long,” Octavia tells him when he gives her a skeptical look. “I know how the little devils operate.”), she kisses his cheek, tells him to calm down and drink a beer or something, and leaves.

The moment the door closes behind her, Bellamy sits down at his kitchen table and opens his laptop to start googling.

He stares at the blank searchbar for an embarrassingly long time, not sure what to type. Finally, he remembers Clarke’s outburst and slowly types, “baby size of avocado.”

Bellamy’s a little perplexed when the majority of the ridiculous number of results say that a fetus is the size of an avocado at sixteen weeks of pregnancy, because he’s pretty sure it hasn’t been sixteen whole weeks since Halloween. But then he falls down the _WebMD_ rabbit hole, and figures out that weeks aren’t counted from conception, so the timing is right.

Hours slip away as he gets sucked deeper and deeper into the internet’s informative and somewhat terrifying trove of information about pregnancy.

He learns about things that are happening to Clarke’s body that he can never unlearn.

But he also learns that the baby is able to listen to stuff, and that it has eyelashes now.

 _Eyelashes_.

The baby Clarke’s carrying is the size of an avocado, and it can hear them talk, and it has hair and eyebrows and _eyelashes._  

And that baby’s _his_.

He’s done a pretty okay job of being a big brother, he thinks, and he thinks he’s a pretty decent friend, and before she died, his mother told him he was a good son. But this?

He finally manages to think the words.

He’s going to be a dad.

He’s not so sure how good he’ll be at that, but he’s going to try his goddamned hardest to be the best dad that little avocado could ever ask for.

* * *

Bellamy texts Clarke regularly over the next couple of days, mostly little, easy questions about how she’s feeling and what she’s doing.

Her texts are short, polite, and have perfect grammar. She tells him she’s feeling fine, that she drinks ginger ale out of habit rather than out of necessity now, and that makes him wonder how bad her morning sickness got at its worst. _WebMD_ says it could be mild and only last a couple weeks, or it could be so bad it requires hospitalization. Bellamy hopes that it didn’t come to that, and logically he can almost convince himself that Clarke would have _mentioned_ being that sick if she had been, but even if she only had a mild case…

He knows that she lives with Raven, so at least she wasn’t alone, but the guilt he feels at the idea of her sick and hurting because of––well, because of him––

It’s not a nice feeling.

(It’s a goddamned shitty feeling, actually; he feels like the world’s biggest asshole, and he doesn’t really think he’s going to ever be able to _stop_ feeling that way because he can’t travel back in time and there’s no way to fix the moment he let her slip away in Mount Weather.)

Late in the week, he’s at the grocery store picking up some food for his empty-ass apartment. One minute he’s debating the buy-two-get-three-free sale on Coke products (seriously, how do they make any _money_ ), the next he catches himself staring at the ginger ale, wondering if Seagram’s or Canada Dry is the better brand.

He shakes his head and starts to push his cart away. Then he sighs, doubles back, and puts a twelve-pack of each next to the Coke.

Just in case.

Bellamy’s in the produce section when he first gets the smallest inkling of an idea. The avocados aren’t on sale, given that it’s still February, but when he holds one in his hand (and he’s only distracted for a _second,_ okay, jesus) it’s perfectly ripe.

The idea grows more defined as he stares thoughtfully at the produce display, and that’s why when Clarke opens her door the next afternoon for their scheduled follow-up talk, he holds up a grocery bag full of avocados.

“Bellamy?” she says, glancing between the bag and his face. “Um, hi?”

“Hi,” he says, and ignores the faint burn in his cheeks. “Seventeen weeks now, right?”

She glances down at herself, then back at him. This time she’s wearing a soft-looking t-shirt, the curve of her belly clearly outlined through the thin fabric.

“Yeah,” she says, a puzzled look on her face. “Seventeen.”

“That means it’s the size of an onion now,” he says. “Avocados are safe.” He jiggles the bag a little, and he sees the realization dawning.

“You brought me an avocado?” she asks, her cheeks flushing prettily ( _not_ that he’s noticing, because that’s _not_ what should be important to him right now).

He brought her seventeen avocados, actually, but he’s not going to tell her that.

“I know a pretty good recipe for avocado pasta,” he offers. “It sounds weird, I know, but it’s one of my sister’s favorite foods, and I thought you might like it.”

A blindingly brilliant smile slowly takes over her face, and Bellamy again tries in vain to tell himself that thoughts about how pretty her blush is or how cute the little beauty mark next to her curved lips is _really_ shouldn’t even be crossing his mind right now.

But it’s no surprise to him when he fails, pretty magnificently, to not fall in love at least a little with the way she looks when she smiles like that.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, all of the feedback from you guys about last chapter blew me away! I especially enjoyed hearing everyone's reactions to Johnroe! :D Hope you like this latest installment-let me know!


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Clarke's past, and her present.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As lushatrocity put it so perfectly, last time we saw Bellamy Blake go through the "seven stages of man-terror." Now we'll go back to Clarke. Sorry this one took a little longer; life is crazy busy right now!

Clarke has never considered herself a particularly sex-crazed person. She’s had her fair share of sex, true, and she enjoys it, but her tryst with Bellamy was an anomaly in the history of Clarke Griffin’s sexual behavior. Her previous sexual encounters typically took place within steady, committed relationships, of which she’s had three.

 

The first is Wells. After growing up together, they grow just as easily into a relationship. It starts in middle school, when dating means holding hands and, if you are especially brave, close-mouthed kisses after school dances. Not many of the similar relationships between their classmates last, but theirs does.

It lasts through the transition to high school. It lasts through their sophomore year, when Wells goes to Germany as an exchange student and they can only see each other over skype for a solid ten months. It lasts through their first fumbling attempt at sex when he finally gets back, and then lasts still through the less embarrassing, more satisfying attempts to follow. The only thing it can’t last through is the car crash that takes Wells, his dad, and Clarke’s own father the spring of their junior year.

 

The second is Quint. She meets him midway through her freshman year of college, right around the time she changes her major from biology to art and her mother starts threatening to stop paying tuition. Her mother had remarried relatively soon after Jake Griffin had died, and Clarke’s new stepfather does his best to soothe Abby’s temper, but even Marcus Kane can’t control her mother when she’s in a rage.

Quint is the perfect distraction. He’s a gruff but attractive sophomore, major still undeclared. Having a date to the movies and an excuse not to go home on long weekends is good, but the sex is even better. She dates him and sleeps with him until Monroe and Raven ambush her in their dorm room, refusing to let her leave until they point out that Quint asks far too many questions about their Spanish 1B homework and far too few about Clarke.

She doesn’t want to acknowledge that they’re right, but when she stops offering answers for verb conjugations and Quint then starts accusing her of being a “selfish bitch,” she gathers what’s left of her pride to dump him.

 

The third is Lexa. Though they later joke about how cliché it seems, they meet in a Gender and Pop Culture class. Clarke is taking it for an elective, Lexa as part of her major requirement for Gender Studies. It’s good, really good, for a long time. With Lexa, Clarke relearns how to be soft and trusting and intimate with someone the way she hasn’t been since Wells. Lexa has more experience with women than Clarke does, but that doesn’t mean their relationship is unbalanced, or that the sex is one-sided. As long as they want the same things, their relationship is wonderful, and when they realize they don’t, it’s over.

 

Since she graduated and moved north with Raven and Monroe, Clarke’s gone on a few dates here and there, slept with a couple of them in the three years she’s lived here. But she’s never made a habit of casual sex, and in general, Clarke doesn’t usually suffer when she goes long periods of time between sexual partners. When she got pregnant, she’d worried that the hormones all the books talked about would turn her into some sex-crazed maniac. Which, you know, would be really awkward considering she’s knocked up and really doesn’t want to be hooking up with random strangers to satisfy any urges. But she’s been pleasantly surprised––her body has tended to notice other bodies no more than usual.

Her agent, Anya, is as stunning as ever whenever they skype about new work offers, but Clarke’s felt no need to crawl through the webcam and jump the other woman.

Atom, her favorite barista at The Dripship, is still one of the cutest guys she interacts with on a regular basis, but Clarke is no more inclined to slip him her phone number or invite him for a quickie than she used to be.

And for god’s sake, those actors on the CW are _ridiculously_ attractive, but watching the shows hardly sends her into a frenzy of need. And so Clarke’s concluded, gratefully, that she just isn’t one of those pregnant women constantly besieged by needy, horny hormones.

At least, that’s what she thought.

And then Bellamy Blake walked back into her life.

Being unaffected by those pregnancy hormones?

No. Such. Luck.

* * *

Clarke hadn’t been able to stop smiling when Bellamy gently deposited the bag of avocados in her arms, then stood on her front porch looking incredibly awkward and incredibly cute.

“Pasta sounds good,” she had said, and he had grinned and sprinted back to his car for another bag of groceries.

And now Bellamy Blake is in her kitchen.

 _Cooking_.

Clarke lives there, and she’s almost never in her kitchen cooking.

It hardly seems real that there’s a _man_ rifling through her drawers and cabinets and looking unfairly attractive as he mutters something about a blender. After he had made sure it was okay with her that he cooked, he’d started puttering around the kitchen trying to find all the tools he needed.

“Is there anything I can do to help?” she asks uncertainly, and she hopes he doesn’t notice the wobble in her voice that is absolutely not due to the fact that he’s stretching one long arm up to get something out of the top shelf of the cabinet.

He’s just so––so–– _tall_ , is all. Clarke’s just impressed that he can reach the shelf she needs a stool to reach.

Really.

“Nope,” Bellamy says, turning back to her and laying a cutting board down on the counter.

Huh. That’s where the cutting board went.

“You like garlic, right?” he suddenly asks her.

“Who doesn’t?” Clarke replies.

He reaches into the fruit bowl where she had unloaded his gift (and there are so _many_ of them) and pulls a couple avocados out.

Bellamy eyes her, knife in one hand poised above the avocado in his other.

“It’s not going to freak you out to watch this, is it?” he asks.

Clarke wrinkles her nose. “I’ll be _fine._ How long are you going to hold that against me?”

It’s not her _fault_ that the stupid baby hormones made her blubber over the thought of eating avocados.

“Probably forever,” he remarks, a grin on his lips, and Clarke’s glad he turns his attention back to the food so he doesn’t see her reaction.

It’s just as joke; she shouldn’t worry about whether or not he means words like _forever._

Besides, she doesn’t even know if she would be worried if he means it, or if he doesn’t.

So.

Instead of worrying, Clarke just watches him cook.

And if Clarke was distracted by how _tall_ Bellamy is, watching him cook opens up a whole new world of trouble.

Bellamy’s finished chopping up the avocado and dumping it into the blender Monroe had bought during a juicing phase. The phase lasted about three weeks, and then Monroe swore off juice for half a year; when she was packing her things to move in with Murphy she had sneered at the appliance and said “Good riddance.”

Now he rhythmically rocks the knife over the cloves of garlic, mincing them into smaller and smaller pieces, but Clarke’s eyes aren’t on the ingredients. Instead she’s stuck watching the way the muscles in his arms tense and shift with every movement he makes, the way his shirt drapes over his shoulders and the v-neck reveals the edge of his collarbone and the slightest dusting of dark hair.

She really _had_ figured she was an outlier, and wasn’t affected the way all the pregnancy books said she would be in the second trimester.

But apparently her body just chose to wait until the most awkward moment possible for her hormones to start raging.

“––lemons?”

Clarke’s eyes snap to Bellamy’s to find that he’s looking at her with concern, and she feels way too hot in her skin, though she tries to convince herself she’s just not used to how warm the kitchen gets when someone is actually cooking.

“Are you okay?” he asks. “You were kind of zoning out.”

“I’m fine,” she says, shifting a little on her stool. Is it too obvious to cross her legs? She does it anyway. “Just thinking. About stuff.”

He raises an eyebrow. “Stuff?”

“And things,” she adds. “What were you saying?”

“I was asking if you like lemons,” he replies slowly. “They’re in the recipe.”

“I hate fish, brazil nuts, coconut water, swiss cheese, and jicama,” Clarke announces. “Do yourself a favor and assume I like everything other than those things.”

“You’re not supposed to eat a lot of fish anyway,” Bellamy comments, then immediately the tips of his ears redden.

Clarke stares at him. “Just how much did you google?”

His shoulders hunch a bit, which she notices because her body is _definitely_ still _very_ interested in how his body is moving. “Just a little,” he says.

“Just a little?”

“Every day,” he adds grudgingly when she keeps looking at him.

Clarke tries not to laugh, she really does, but when a giggle slips out and Bellamy gets this completely indignant look on his face, she loses it. The image of him hunched over a keyboard, googling things like _stretchmarks_ and _weeks of pregnancy_ and _how to deal with your pregnant baby-mama,_ has her nearly hysterical.

When she finally calms, Bellamy’s watching her with a wry expression.

“I’m sorry,” she says, wiping at her eyes.

“Uh huh,” Bellamy replies. “Sure you are.”

“No, I am!” she insists, feeling a little guilty. “I’ve been there. I know the hell that is Google. And apps. I have more pregnancy apps than a single person could ever need. And books! I’ve got six.”

A smile plays at the corners of his mouth as he dumps the garlic into the blender, adds some other things and then presses on the lid.

“It’s just nice to see someone else doing the same thing,” she finishes lamely. She starts fidgeting with her hands, picking at her fingernails.

His hand, big and rough and warm, lays over itself over hers, and she stills.

“It’s fine, Clarke,” he says, eyes gentle. “Really.”

“Okay,” she whispers. She’s simultaneously relieved and disappointed when he moves away to start the pasta on the stove. Relieved, because if he lingered any longer he would have undoubtedly noticed the goosebumps prickling to life all over Clarke’s body. Disappointed, because even that innocent touch did decidedly _not_ innocent things to her, and it’s hard to give up the feeling.

Shit.

“You said your sister likes this recipe?” Clarke says. “How old is she?”

Desperate to distract herself, she’s praying he says his sister’s young, because young children should derail her improper thoughts. Except then, she thinks, he would have been around when his sister was a baby, and that gets her thinking about babies in general, and how he’s the father of _Clarke’s_ baby, and now she’s thinking about how _that_ came about and it’s not a memory that helps calm her system in the _least_ ––

It’s a vicious cycle, and Clarke is only now beginning to realize that she’s doomed.

“Twenty-four,” he replies.

Clarke is silent for a moment. “Um. How old are you?”

Bellamy pauses in the middle of stirring the spaghetti. “I just turned thirty in December.” He glances at her over his shoulder, his expression wary. “Please don’t tell me you’re some freak genius who graduated from UCLA at sixteen.”

Clarke snorts. “Okay, first, do I look like I’m sixteen? Second, you _do_ remember that we met in a club, right?”

He just raises an eyebrow until she sighs. “You idiot, I’m twenty-five.”

“Thank god,” he says.

Clarke watches as he finishes up the meal. He even plates the pasta for her, and gives her way more than she could ever eat along with some salad and garlic bread. Bellamy deposits the plates at the dining table and is back at Clarke’s side in time to offer her a hand as she hops off the stool.

She hopes her hesitation before grabbing his hand isn’t obvious, but for crying out loud, even him helping her off a kitchen stool—which, by the way, is incredibly unnecessary and incredibly sweet—has tingles running from the point of contact all the way down to her toes.

“Dinner is served,” he announces as he pulls out her chair for her. Clarke can’t figure out if the chivalry is habit or an attempt to impress her; either way, she’s enjoying it. (Maybe a little too much.)

“Smells good,” Clarke comments, sitting. “Looks questionable, but I’m willing to try it.”

“Princess, nobody’s ever tried this and not liked it,” Bellamy says, twirling pasta around his fork. “Just eat it.”

Clarke eyes the bright green pasta, but obediently forks some into her mouth, chews, swallows.

“Oh my god,” she moans, eyes closing in bliss. “Your sister has excellent culinary taste.” When she opens her eyes, Bellamy’s staring at her.

“Um.” She blinks slowly as she holds his gaze.  “It’s…it’s really good.”

“Good,” he replies hoarsely, and then they both jump as the front door slams and Raven appears in the kitchen.

“Why do I do this to myself?” she asks as she heads straight to fill a glass with water. “ _Why_?”

“Raven was at the gym,” Clarke explains dryly once her heart resumes its normal rhythm.

Raven waves as she chugs the water.

“Hey,” she says to Bellamy once she’s drained the glass. “What’s all this?” She gestures at the kitchen. Bellamy had cleaned as he went along, but it’s still somewhat cluttered from his cooking.

“Bellamy offered to make dinner,” Clarke says, but she’s not sure if Raven hears her. Her friend is too busy exclaiming in triumph when she finds the rest of the garlic bread warming in the oven.

“Carbs,” she sighs blissfully.

“Those are my carbs,” Clarke complains; Raven ignores her.

“So,” Raven says conversationally, munching on a piece of the bread. She leans back against the island and stares Bellamy down. “I hear you made my girl cry.”

“Raven!” Clarke exclaims. She turns to Bellamy. “Please ignore her. She’s always a little crazy after kickboxing.”

He looks a little alarmed, but he shakes his head. “No, it’s alright. I was an ass,” he says to Raven. “I fucked up.”

Raven nods. “Good. You admit it.” She points at him with her garlic bread. “Don’t do it again.”

Bellamy looks at Clarke when he says, “Not planning on it.”

“One more thing,” Raven says. “What the _hell_ are you guys eating?”

“Avocado pasta,” Clarke replies immediately, grateful that her stupid friend is done embarrassing her. “It’s stupidly delicious.”

“You can eat avocados now?” Raven asks. “You cried over the guacamole at Chipotle last week.”

She spoke too soon.

“No, I’m good,” she mumbles, staring down at her plate as her face heats. She frowns and shoves another huge bite of pasta in her mouth so she doesn’t have to look up and see Bellamy surely stifling his laughter.

But “There’s more on the stove,” is all he says.

“Don’t mind if I do,” Raven says in satisfaction, and is sitting down at the table with her own plate in seconds.

Clarke doesn’t mind her presence, not really, but the rest of the evening isn’t very productive as far as getting to know each other better. But it’s still fun. Bellamy tells a couple funny stories about bartending with his friend Miller at Grounders, and Raven counters with embarrassing stories about Clarke from college; Clarke retaliates by asking Bellamy to please let Wick know the next time he sees him that Clarke would like to tell him about a little adventure called “Raven Reyes and the Spring Break of 2011.”

* * *

Clarke stares balefully at the contents of her closet later that week.

“I have nothing to wear,” she grumbles.

“You have more clothing than Monroe and I combined!” Raven calls from her own bedroom.

“In case you haven’t _noticed_ ,” Clarke replies, shoving hanger after hanger aside. “I’m in the middle of growing another human being, and that makes it a little hard to wear said clothing.”

“I believe in you,” Raven responds dryly.

Clarke digs out a plain black dress from the back of her closet, eyes it critically. It was one she’d bought last year because it was cute on the hanger, but whenever she’d tried to wear it out she was always too self-conscious about the way the waistline made her look pregnant.

“Joke’s on you,” Clarke mutters, yanking it off the hanger and over her head. “I _am_ pregnant.”

“What was that?”

Clarke wiggles into some leggings and shrugs into a thick cardigan. Once her boots are zipped up and her plaid scarf is wound around her neck, she looks in the mirror. “Ugh. I look pregnant.”

Raven sighs from Clarke’s doorway.

“Are you going to be like this until you pop this kid out?”

Clarke glares at Raven in the mirror’s reflection. “Probably.”

Her friend holds her hands up in surrender. “Just checking.”

The dress really doesn’t help things. It’s not that she looks _bad_ , it’s just that she looks, well, really pregnant. Even when Clarke stands sideways, looking in the mirror, and sucks in her stomach as much as she can, the little bump is still obvious. She lets out the breath she was holding and sighs.

“You look fine,” Raven says.

Clarke droops a little. “I look gross.”

“No, you don’t,” Raven replies in a bored tone.

“Look at my skin,” Clarke demands, turning.  Her normally clear skin has been suffering as hormones rage through her body. “My skin is disgusting.”

“Your baby-daddy didn’t seem to mind,” Raven sings.

Clarke’s face erupts in a blush. “What do you mean?” she asks. “And don’t call him that.”

“I _mean_ , when I walked in on your little rendezvous last week?” Raven says, pointing at Clarke.

“He made me dinner,” Clarke protests, “It wasn’t a _rendezvous_.”

“Whatever,” Raven says. “When I walked in on you guys, baby-daddy had _major_ eyes for you, babe.”

“That’s not—he didn’t—” Clarke tries.

“Not to mention the way _you_ were eyefucking him. Don’t deny it,” she adds when Clarke opens her mouth to do just that. “I see all, Clarke. I see _all_.”

Clarke sets her mouth. “Yeah, well, you need glasses.”

“Uh huh,” Raven replies. “You keep telling yourself that.”

Clarke turns back to her mirror. Fine. She will. _If_ Raven saw anything— _if_ —it was hormone-induced. And Clarke is more than her hormones. Really. If they’re going to do this—if she’s going to have a baby, which she is, and co-parent with Bellamy, which seems to be the plan now, she can’t be complicating their already fucked-up situation with her hormonal urges. Clarke is in control, and her hormones won’t get the better of her again.   

She tugs at her sweater and growls.

“Why are you freaking out about your wardrobe again? You’ve only got about a million pairs of leggings and sweaters,” Raven says.

“Remember, the school down the street called last week to set up at talk with one of their classes.” Her work means she’s been involved with some pretty well-known children’s and middle-grade books, so it’s not the first time she’s been asked to present at schools. She usually talks about her job, her background in art, and then leads the group––depending on their age––in some sort of art activity.

Other than the actual art, it’s one of the favorite parts of her job, actually. If she hadn’t been lucky enough to get into illustrating, Clarke thinks she could have been pretty happy as a teacher.

“So?” Raven asks.

Clarke rolls her eyes. “ _So_ , I would probably make a better impression if I didn’t show up looking like a hot mess.”

Raven leers at her comically. “Hot is right.”

Clarke snorts. “Yeah, yeah. Tell that to my zitty chin.”

“Clarke,” Raven says. “You look fine. Trust me, you could show up in a paper bag and that school would tell you that you look good.”

Clarke sighs, but smiles. “Thanks. I have to go. I’m going to be late,” Clarke tells her, and Raven holds out her fist.

“You’re going to kill it, Griffin,” Raven says when Clarke bumps her first.

“I’d hope so,” Clarke replies. “It’s just a bunch of fourth-graders.”

* * *

The teacher who meets her in front of the elementary school is young, pretty, and Clarke’s pretty sure she sees a butterfly wrist tattoo peeking out from under the woman’s long sleeves.

“Nice to meet you, Miss Griffin,” she says, offering her hand.

Clarke shuffles her bags of supplies until she can grab it, shaking firmly twice. “You, too. Mrs. Woods, right? You can call me Clarke, if you want.”

The other woman smiles. “Great.”

Mrs. Woods chatters rapidly as she leads Clarke to her class, asking her about her work, where she lives, how much money she makes with the average illustration contract. The last question would normally make Clarke raise an eyebrow, but then she sees how the woman interacted with her students. Though they’re young, Mrs. Woods is just as sassy and blunt with them as she had been with Clarke, and they all clearly adore her for it.

If little Clarke had been taught by a pretty, sassy teacher with a tattoo, she would probably have adored her as well.

The presentation goes well; the kids are familiar with several of the books she’s worked on, so they’re enthusiastic with their questions, and they have a blast creating the forest scene drawing she walks them through step-by-step.

She finishes just seconds before the lunch bell rings, and with one last “Thank you, Miss Griffin!” they’re hurrying out of the room as Mrs. Woods reminds them to walk, not run.

“That was fantastic,” Mrs. Woods says a little later, walking Clarke out to the parking lot. “The kids loved it. We’ll have to set something up again next year.”

“Oh,” Clarke says, caught a little by surprise. “That would be great, though we’d probably have to plan more in advance. I’m not going to be as readily available by then.”

“Yeah? Do you have fun plans?” she asks in a curious tone.

“Er, kind of,” Clarke replies, then gestures at her belly. “If you like babies.”

“Oh, congrats! How’s the dad feel about it? Is he a hottie?”

Clarke lets out a surprised laugh at the other woman’s blunt questions. “Uh, I think he’s excited about it. And he’s definitely attractive.”

“You _think_ he’s excited? You’re not sure?” Mrs. Woods raises an eyebrow.

“It’s complicated,” Clarke says as she finishes loading her presentation stuff into her car. “He’s a good guy, but we’re not––we’re not together, or anything. The whole baby thing kind of came out of nowhere, so I don’t blame him if he’s a little freaked.”

“Hell, I’d be freaked if I were in your shoes,” she replies. “My husband and I have been married for two years, and we’re still years away from wanting kids.”

“Oh, I am freaked, believe me. But excited, too,” Clarke adds. She slams her trunk shut. “Anyway, I’d better get going. Call me about setting up next year’s visit, okay?”

“Sure thing,” the other woman agrees, and watches as Clarke slides into her car and starts the engine.

Clarke rolls down the window. “It was nice to meet you, Mrs. Woods,” she says with a smile.

The teacher grins back. “Call me Octavia.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What I got from your comments last time was that you all felt personally victimized by Bellamy Blake and his seventeen avocados. ;D Thank you all for that!! 
> 
> Not a TON of Bellarke interaction in this one, but there's plenty more to come. ;) Let me know your thoughts <3
> 
> Also I'm not making this up, [avocado pasta is crazy delicious.](http://damndelicious.net/2014/06/20/avocado-pasta/)


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bellamy reluctantly attends his brother-in-law's showcase.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so sorry this took forever and a day. Things have been CRAZY! But on the bright side, I finished my master's defense and basically have my master's degree now; just two more weeks of class and finals and I'm legit, guys. 
> 
> Hope you enjoy!

Octavia’s been looking forward to Lincoln’s showcase for weeks.

Bellamy has not.

Yeah, his brother-in-law is talented—and talented in the kind of art that makes sense to Bellamy, not the kind that others stare at while talking about the piece’s “intention”—but Octavia always makes them wear ties to these things and the bar only ever serves mediocre wine and crappy light beer. Last year’s hadn’t been terrible because Octavia had been home sick and both he and Lincoln pulled off their ties as soon as they sent her a picture of themselves wearing them in the gallery. Come to think of it, that was also the only time he’d left one of Lincoln’s showcases early, with a brunette named Roma he ended up seeing a couple more times.

But he’s not seeing anybody, and it feels like the absolute worst time to be trying to pick up someone new, given the whole Clarke situation. So instead he’d aimed a half-hearted invitation at Miller earlier that day—maybe if he brought along a buddy like a fucking sixth-grader, it wouldn’t be quite the ordeal it usually is—but his friend had just laughed in his face and told him to man the fuck up.

He’d briefly considered asking Clarke if she wanted to go—it seemed like the kind of thing she might like, what with the paintings all over her house. But the idea seemed perilously similar to asking her on a date, and he doesn’t know what kind of message that would send but it would almost definitely be wrong somehow. Plus his sister has been nagging at him to meet Clarke for weeks, basically ever since he told her he got a girl pregnant, and Lincoln’s showcase hardly seems the best place to introduce them.

So now he’s here, sidling into the gallery friendless and dateless and Clarkeless. His sister spots him and makes a beeline for him, Lincoln trailing behind.

“You’re late!” she tells him as she hugs him, and then all of a sudden he’s wearing a _fucking_ tie because Octavia’s produced a spare out of her purse and has it around his neck before he can even get out a protest.

“Stop her. Please.”

“Sorry,” Lincoln shrugs. “She got me before we even left the house.”

Octavia rolls her eyes. “God forbid you two put on a shirt that buttons _and_ a tie. I deserve to be surrounded by two well-dressed men, alright?”

“Wow, you’d almost think tonight’s about you,” Bellamy retorts, and tries to loosen the tie a little. Octavia slaps at his hands.

“Leave it,” she orders. Bellamy curls his lip at her, but leaves the noose in place as he wanders around the gallery with them.

He’s been there about an hour when he surreptitiously pulls out his phone to text Clarke. It’s been a week since he made her dinner and nearly humiliated himself when she made that _sound_ when she tasted the food. Every day since, he’s had to work, and whenever he was free, she was working or sleeping or busy. But they text on a daily basis, and the conversation is slowly creeping out of the stilted, proper text-speak that happens between strangers and mild acquaintance, and into a more relaxed and light-hearted tone. Sometimes, when Grounders is slow, he’ll flip through the stained, ancient pages of the recipe books they never use; whenever he finds a mint-flavored drink that sounds like something she’d like, he takes a picture of the recipe and sends it to her.

The first time he did that was the first time their texts broke through the awkwardly-polite barrier.

 _Ruuuuuuuuuuude,_ she had texted him. _Don’t you know it’s v inconsiderate to send a pregnant woman recipes for delicious alcoholic drinks??? :P_

He’d barked out a laugh when he first saw the cheeky little smiley face; ever since then, he covers the alcoholic ingredients with his fingers and texts her the virgin ingredients only.

When Octavia and Lincoln are distracted with an older couple interested in one of Lincoln’s bigger pieces, he types out a quick message to Clarke, asking how she’s doing and what she’s up to. He makes sure his phone is on vibrate before he slips it back into his pocket; the first time he came to one of these things, his sister had nearly murdered him when his ringer went off and everybody turned to look at the source of Bastille’s “Pompeii.”

Clarke usually responds pretty promptly, so when she doesn’t text back over the next couple minutes he stomps down the disappointment and figures she must be asleep already. It’s early for a weekend night, but still a reasonable hour to sleep.

Octavia gestures at him; he sighs and trails behind his sister and Lincoln as they make their rounds through the gallery. They pause after a few minutes to interact with the people scattered in front of Bellamy’s favorite part of Lincoln’s current exhibit. It’s a life size portrait of his sister, but her tattoo is the only thing unchanged in the painting: her hair is in intricate braids and she’s covered from neck to toe in what looks like dark leather armor, sword in her hand and warpaint on her face. The edge of the butterfly is just barely visible on the wrist that holds her weapon.

Bellamy’s so concentrated on the painting, on finding all the little details that Lincoln’s stuck in like easter eggs, that it takes him a good minute to notice the blonde hair of the woman diagonal from him. He can only see part of her face, but it’s enough to see the way she’s frowning thoughtfully at the painting, and the familiar curve of her jaw.

Before he can say anything, Octavia and Lincoln move forward to do the polite meet-and-greet thing with her. She jumps a little and turns when his sister says something, and he can now see that it _is_ Clarke.

He moves forward until he’s side by side with his sister, just in time for her to say in a surprised tone, “Octavia?”

“Clarke?” he asks at the same time as his sister.

“Octavia?” Bellamy echoes Clarke, frowning at his sister, who suddenly finds the painting of herself riveting.

“Bellamy?” Clarke looks utterly bewildered. “What’s going on?”

“I have no idea,” he says. “O?”

“Hi Clarke,” Lincoln says with a sheepish wave.

“Hey, Lincoln. Good turnout,” she says, but her voice is a little dazed.

“What the _hell_ is going on here?” Bellamy demands. He’s a little puzzled by how Lincoln and Clarke know each other, but he’s more concerned about Octavia. He points at his sister accusingly. “How do you know Clarke?”

“Ah—” Octavia starts, but Clarke interrupts.

“I met her at a school thing I did for her class,” Clarke says, brow furrowed as she glances between them. “How do _you_ know her?”

Bellamy grits his teeth. “She’s my sister.”

Clarke’s mouth drops open in a little ‘o.’ “And you’re Lincoln’s wife,” she says to Octavia. “Lincoln Woods, Octavia Woods. I guess I didn’t make the connection.”

“Maiden name Blake,” Bellamy adds. “When, exactly, did you meet her?”

Clarke blinks innocently. “A few days ago.”

“Excuse me a minute,” he manages to say, then gestures sharply at his sister to follow him into the less-populated corner nearby.

“What the _fuck_ , Octavia?” he growls. His sister just frowns and crosses her arms over her chest.

“What?”

“Don’t,” he bites out. “Don’t fucking act like you don’t know what I’m talking about.”

Her mouth presses into a thin line, but her fingers worry at the sleeves of her dress. It’s a familiar expression, given that Bellamy raised her on his own from the time she was sixteen. His sister is pissed, but knows she’s in trouble.

“Octavia Marie Blake,” he says lowly. Her jaw drops and she uncrosses her arms to shove at him.

“It’s _Woods_ , and I’m not fucking twelve years old, Bellamy; don’t you dare think that middle name bullshit is going to work.”

“I can’t believe you,” he replies. “Going behind my back to harass Clarke? What the fuck did you think you were doing?”

“I was protecting your sorry ass!” she cries. “I don’t want anything bad to happen to you because you want to help every sad girl who looks your way, you jerk.”

“That’s not—” he breaks off with a frustrated growl. “That’s not your job, O.”

She raises an eyebrow, still glaring at him. “I disagree. And I didn’t _harass_ her, asshole.”

“God, Octavia, how the fuck did you even find her?”

At that, she does blanche a little. “Uh…”

Bellamy narrows his eyes. “What did you do.”

“I found her in your phone contacts, okay?” his sister says in a rush. “So I got her last name and number, and then I googled her and found out about the art stuff.”

Bellamy has no fucking idea when his sister would have done that. He can’t think of any moment he left her alone with his phone in the last couple weeks.

“What the hell is wrong with you?” he asks wearily.

“Fuck you,” Octavia replies.

“Just—just fucking leave her alone, alright? She doesn’t need to deal with this right now.”

“Bellamy.” Octavia’s brow is furrowed in that familiar way. “ _This_? Like, what, the fact that you have a family who’s interested in your well-being and making sure she’s not some psycho out to ruin your life? If this baby thing is legit, she’s going to be dealing with _this_ for the rest of her life.”

He swallows hard.

“For what it’s worth, she didn’t seem like a psycho out to ruin your life,” she adds grudgingly. “I’m not a hundred percent sold or anything, but I liked what I saw when she came to my class.”

“Well, that’s fucking great for you,” he says. “But now I’ve got to deal with the mess you’ve made with Clarke, so could you maybe not stalk her for a while?”

“Fuck off,” she says, but there’s a note of fondness in it as she bumps her knuckles against his arm.

He sighs, and turns to go find Clarke and Lincoln. He doesn’t know exactly how to explain that his sister isn’t a lunatic, but he’s got to try.

Only when Octavia and Bellamy get back to Lincoln, the petite blonde is nowhere to be found.

“Where’d Clarke go?” Bellamy asks, searching the crowded gallery for a glimpse of her golden hair. A lot of people are eyeing him and his sister, but he ignores them.

“She left,” Lincoln says, and shrugs helplessly when Bellamy swings his gaze to gape at him. “I tried to explain that shouting is a normal volume level for you two, but I’m not sure she believed me because she headed out about five minutes ago.”

“She looked pretty embarrassed,” he adds gently, looking at his wife, and Octavia has the grace to look a little ashamed.

“Fuck,” Bellamy mutters. “Shit, I’m sorry about this happening at your showcase, man.”

Lincoln’s already shaking his head. “Don’t be. It’s probably the most interesting showcase I’ve ever had. Definitely one of the loudest.”

Bellamy snorts and starts loosening his tie. “Listen, I’m going to go. I need to talk to Clarke.”

Octavia makes a little sound, and he frowns at her as he thrusts the tie back at her. “I came, alright? It’s not my fault I have to go fix things with her.”

“Fine,” she says, stuffing the tie in her purse. “You can tell her I’m sorry, if you want.” Her expression tells him she’s not sorry one bit.

“Bellamy,” Lincoln says. His eyes are dark and serious when Bellamy glances at him. “She’s a good person. You could have done a lot worse.”

“Done a lot worse than accidentally knock up a good person and fuck up her entire future?” he replies dryly. “Yeah, that makes me feel so much better. I’ll see you guys later.”

“Wait,” he hears Octavia saying as he walks away. “You _know_ her, know her?”

* * *

 

Bellamy texts Clarke as soon as he gets home, a thread of panic coiling in his chest at the thought of what she must think about his sister, about him.

 _I’m sorry about my sister,_ he sends.

Then he realizes it’s nearly midnight, and he wants to kick his own ass because jesus, she’s probably asleep.

But she texts back almost immediately. _You don’t have to apologize for her_ , her message reads.

 _Still,_ he replies. _Can we meet up to talk? I swear insanity doesn’t run in my family._

His phone buzzes. _Tomorrow’s good for me. 10 at The Dripship on 12th?_

 _Sounds good,_ he responds. He hesitates, then sends another message.

_Thanks._

* * *

 

He shows up twenty minutes early, a product of barely having slept the night before and of leaving his apartment way ahead of time to find whatever the hell The Dripship is.

Turns out it’s a coffee shop, it’s ridiculously easy to find, and Clarke has still managed to beat him there.

She’s just finished ordering at the counter when he taps her on the shoulder. She jumps a little, and the change she just accepted from the cashier goes flying.

“Crap,” she mutters, then realizes he’s there. “Oh, uh, hi.”

“Hi,” he says, and waves at her to keep standing as he crouches and picks up all the stray coins. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you.”

“It’s alright,” she replies. Bellamy pours the money into her outstretched palm and takes her in. She looks much better rested than he feels, which is good.  Her cheeks are rosy and she’s all bundled up in a bulky sweater and plaid scarf.

“You look nice,” he blurts out, and then tries not to cringe. Jesus, now it sounds like he’s trying to pick up on her. But she _does_ look nice, all cozy and cute and shit.

Fuck.

 _Fuck_.

“Thanks,” she says calmly, and then goes to retrieve her drink when the barista calls her name.

“Can I help you?” he hears, and he realizes he’s still standing in front of the ordering counter.

He fumbles through ordering coffee, glancing apologetically at the handful of people who had ended up stuck behind him as he made an absolute fool of himself.

Clarke waves at him from a table by the window when he looks around, and he hurries to sit across from her.

“What did you get?” she asks, sipping from her own cup.

“Oh, uh, just coffee. With cream and sugar,” he replies. “You?”

She sighs. “Hot apple cider. It’s good, but I’d kill for some coffee.”

“Oh. Sorry,” he replies. “I could, uh, go get something else. Not taunt you with it and all that.”

She smiles at him, and he ends up taking a too-big, too-fast gulp of the scalding coffee. “Don’t be silly, I’m used to it. Raven still brews a fresh pot every morning; if I can suffer through my whole house smelling like it, I can deal with you drinking a single cup.”

He nods, tries not to choke or let on that his mouth is burnt to hell.

“So,” Clarke says, and her smile fades. “Last night.”

“I’m so sorry,” he blurts out. “I had no idea my sister had tracked you down; I swear she’s not normally that crazy.”

She sips and considers him. “You two must be very close. She seems very protective of you.”

He shrugs. “Uh, well it was always just us. My mom and Octavia and me. So it’s kind of mutual.”

“That’s nice,” Clarke says, her voice a little wistful. “I’m an only child. I always wished for a brother or sister, but…” She shrugs. “Didn’t happen.”

She shifts a little, and Bellamy can tell she’s tapping away on her belly again.  

“Have you…have you told your mom about this?” she says.

It feels a little like the air’s been sucked out of his lungs.

“No,” he says abruptly. “She died. Eight years ago.”

“Oh,” she says, very softly. “I’m sorry.” Then he could almost see her working it out in her head. “I don’t mean to pry, you don’t have to answer this, but that means Octavia was only sixteen?”

“It’s alright,” Bellamy says. “Yeah, O was sixteen. But Mom had been sick for a while, and she’d already arranged everything so I got to keep O when...when she died.”

“Cancer?”

He nods, and then the thought hits him like a boulder, and he feels stricken. “Shit, I should have mentioned this earlier, shouldn’t I? Genetics and shit. Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck.”

“Bellamy!” Clarke’s little hand curls around the fist he just banged on their table. “Calm down,” she urges. “It’s alright.”

“But I—”

“It doesn’t matter right now,” Clarke says firmly. “Even if I had known about your mother’s cancer from the beginning, I would have kept this baby.”

He wills his fist to unclench, then carefully turns his palm over so Clarke’s hand is resting in his. She squeezes his hand, and he lets out a long, deep breath.

“Sorry,” he says eventually. “I’m not—I swear I’m usually better at keeping my temper. I’m not going to be like this around the kid.” Bellamy’s well aware that he probably looks like a fucking moron, all pleading and moony and shit, but _fuck,_ has he screwed things up over the last twenty-four hours.

“It’s okay. I’ve had my fair share of panic so far,” she says. “You’re just making up for lost time.” She pulls her hand out of his to pick up her cider again, and Bellamy pretends he doesn’t miss it.

“So, now that you know that not only is my sister a lunatic, but so am I…” he begins, and she laughs.

“You’re not lunatics. I mean, your sister’s a little questionable—and I don’t appreciate her methods at _all_ —but I actually really liked her when I met her and didn’t know she thought I might be a gold-digging psycho.”

“That’s—that’s good,” he says lamely. “Because you’ll probably be seeing a lot of each other.”

She looks a little nervous at that. “Oh, well, yeah. I guess your family kind of comes with the whole baby package.”  

“Lincoln is pretty normal, and it seemed like you already knew him,” Bellamy offers.

Clarke nods. “Yeah. The art community is pretty small around here. I met him at his showcase last year.”

“No shit? I was there.” He’s not really sure how he could have missed her, though Roma _had_ made an admirable effort to distract him from everything and everyone else that night. “Do you do this art stuff often?”

She looks amused. “Well, considering it’s my job, yeah. I haven’t had a showcase of my own since my senior year of college, though. Most of my paintings aren’t the gallery type.”

He thinks about the paintings he remembers hanging in her house and disagrees, but doesn’t say anything.

“Anybody other than your sister and Lincoln I should know about?” Clarke asks. “Will a great-aunt ambush me in the grocery store? Will a third cousin twice removed follow me around the library?”

“No,” Bellamy says. “It’s just us. What about you, princess?”

Her cup pauses in mid-air for a second, then she drains the rest of her drink. “Nobody around.”

“Around?” he repeats slowly. “Like, in the area, or…”

“My dad’s dead,” she says, and his heart thumps painfully at the audible ache in her voice. “About eight years ago, too. My mom and I...well, we don’t really talk much. She lives down in Orange County.”

“Oh.” He watches her. “I’m sorry.”

She shrugs, and then says in a too-bright voice, “My friends want to meet you, though. Officially? I don’t really know what that means in our kind of situation, but Monroe just got back from her honeymoon and she’s apparently very eager to meet you.” She bites her lip. “Is that okay?”

“Sure. I remember her,” Bellamy says. “Ginger, very happy.”

“Drunk Monroe is usually very happy,” Clarke agrees. She grabs her purse off the back of her chair and stands. “But sober Monroe gets pissed when I’m late, and I’m supposed to meet her for lunch.”

“Oh, okay.” His chair scrapes across the floor with a hideous noise  when he hurries to stand too. “So…are we good?” he asks awkwardly.

_Do you forgive me for being a total ass last night, and my sister for being a maniac?_

“We’re good,” she says, and he falls into step next to her as she starts walking toward the door. “I’ll text you about meeting up with my friends sometime, okay?”

“Great,” he says, and tries to convince himself he didn’t sound like a fifteen-year-old who had just gotten his crush to agree to a date. “And I’ll...work on my sister.”

“I’d like to meet her, you know, not under false pretenses,” Clarke replies. She pauses next to the doorway. Bellamy looks down at her just in time for her to stretch up and place a soft kiss on his cheek. “Talk to you later, Bellamy,” she says, and slips out the door with one last smile.

He stares after her, stunned, and blurts out a belated “Yeah, okay. Have a good lunch!” when she’s already climbing into a little slate blue car.

He watches her drive away. The skin her lips touched almost tingles, and when he touches his face absently he can feel just a hint of her chapstick left behind.

Bellamy groans and forces himself to head toward his own car. “I’m so fucked.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let me know your thoughts!


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Monroe's back from her honeymoon; Clarke dreams and has a visitor.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This story has been nominated over at [Bellarke Fanfiction Awards](http://bellarkefanfictionawards.tumblr.com/) for Best Pregnancy Fiction! [You can vote once a day](http://bellarkefanfictionawards.tumblr.com/trope:pregnancy) until June 30th. If you're enjoying it, consider popping over and voting for me! 
> 
> Ack! It's been a month! Sorry about the wait, everyone; yet again, real life has proceeded to kick my butt. Finished up my last quarter of grad school (thanks for everyone's kind comments, last time!), wrote a seminar paper on fan writing in The 100 fandom, went out of town for over a week...and now I'm unemployed and need to find a job! But rest assured, even if updates take a while, I would never abandon this story (especially without notice!). Hopefully updates will come a little more often now, but we'll see. Thanks for sticking around anyway; I appreciate every one of you! <3
> 
> Anyway, so, this fic is rated E, right? But there hasn't been anything steamy since that very first chapter.
> 
> Well, just so you're prepared, Build Some Dreams is going to work at earning its rating some more as Clarke has some ~me-time~.

Clarke didn’t lie; she _is_ meeting Monroe for lunch—they’re just meeting at Clarke’s house, not out. But Bellamy already seemed so anxious after last night’s fiasco at the gallery, she didn’t want to make him feel worse by acting like she was ditching him just to go home.

Not that she should _worry_ about making him feel bad. She doesn’t want to be mean, of course, and they’re friendly and all, and he’s kind of the father of her baby, but he’s not her boyfriend or anything.

Clarke just wants to be nice. That’s all.

It makes sense to be nice to someone she’s going to have to deal with for the rest of her life.

But she’s not at all certain that kissing him was necessary for niceness. 

She hasn’t yet told Raven about last night at the gallery, didn't tell her why she was meeting Bellamy for coffee (or stupid apple cider in her case) right before Monroe was due to arrive at the house for a post-honeymoon catch-up.

So Raven's at the dining table, surrounded by her laptop and papers when Clarke gets home and slams into the house. She doesn't even bother to glance up when Clarke collapses in the chair across from her.

"What's your deal?" she asks absently. 

“I kissed him!” Clarke blurts out. Raven looks up, shoves her reading glasses up on top of her head.

“Wait, what? Already?” her friend asks. “Damn, Griffin.”

“Well. Kind of,” Clarke amends. “It was on the cheek.”

Raven groans and rolls her eyes. “You’re pathetic.”

Clarke huffs. “Aren’t you supposed to have some sage advice for me? What kind of best friend are you?”

Raven lowers her glasses again and gives Clarke a look. “You want sage advice? A kiss on the cheek is pathetic. You need to bang that boy like a screen door in a hurricane.”

“Raven!”

“Don’t ‘Raven’ me,” Raven says, turning her attention back to her paperwork. “You know you want to.”

Clarke wants to deny it.

But.

It’s true.

“I shouldn’t,” she says instead. She really, really shouldn't. Complicating whatever  _this_ is between them? That sounds like the opposite of a good idea to her brain, as much as  _other,_ lower parts of her would like to disagree,

Raven shrugs. “Why not? It’s not like you can get even more pregnant. I mean, I’m pretty impressed by his one-night-stand super-sperm, but even super-sperm can’t knock you up even more.”

“Super-sperm?” Clarke echoes dryly. “Really?”

“Yeah. It just—” Raven makes a fist and punches her palm. “ _Went_ for it. It was like, ‘hey, I’m going to get me some of _that_ ,’ and then wham. Your eggo is preggo.”

“Just curious—what the hell is wrong with you?”

“You’re just jealous because I’m getting laid regularly,” Raven says. “Which is how I know you need some action, babe.”

Clarke growls in frustration.

“Next time, just aim for his lips,” Raven says, then makes a sound of disgust and scribbles all over one of the pieces of paper she’s staring at. “Skip the third-grade kiss on the cheek crap,” she adds distractedly. “That boy is yours for the taking.”

It’s far too tempting a thought. “That’s one of the worst ideas I’ve ever heard.”

Her body is practically chanting  _Do it, do it, do it, DO IT._

Raven glances up. “Depends on your perspective. Do you like him?”

“I hardly know him,” Clarke replies after a moment.

“Clarke.”

“It’s true,” she insists. “I’ve only met him a couple of times. That’s not enough time to know him!”

“That’s bullshit,” Raven replies. She watches Clarke expectantly, and Clarke resists the urge to fidget. Raven’s not her mother, and Clarke shouldn’t feel like she’s in the middle of a lecture on how to behave.

“Yes,” she finally says. She likes him. She doesn’t know much about Bellamy Blake, but what little she does, she likes—a lot. He’s sweet, and funny. He seems smart, and dedicated to his sister, and his brother-in-law by extension. Even when he gets angry or flustered or yells, it’s because he’s passionate about something, which is something Clarke can understand. The fact that he’s passionate about being there for their child, and for her, just means her understanding is accompanied by a warm, fluttery sort of happiness.

That’s one of the parts that has Clarke holding back; liking him, she can understand. Feeling that warm, fluttery happiness as a result of man she’s spent only a handful of hours with? That’s where she’s afraid.

Raven’s watching her, a considering expression on her face. “You don’t have to jump him right away or anything,” she says eventually. “I don’t think he’s going anywhere anytime soon.”

Clarke nods, sighing a little as her shoulders relax.

“But Clarke?”

She looks at her friend.

“You can’t think he’s going to stay single forever,” Raven says. “He seems like a good guy, and he seems focused on you and the kid right now. But just because he’s going to be a dad doesn’t mean he’ll never want an adult relationship.”

Clarke swallows hard, her gut twisting at the thought.

“So you need to think, okay? Get to know him more, sure. But one day, he’s going to want to be with someone, and you’re going to want to be with someone, too. If that someone is him, don’t let yourself be too afraid to go for it.”

Clarke doesn’t know what she means to say to that when she opens her mouth to respond, but before she utters a word, she’s interrupted by a wild rapping at the front door, then a jingle of keys turning the lock.

“Honeys, I’m home!” Monroe sings as she comes inside.

Raven gives Clarke a look that says the discussion is _not_ over, and they get up to greet their friend.

Clarke’s still a little off-kilter after her meeting with Bellamy and her subsequent talk with Raven, but the next few moments are a flurry of shrieks, hugs, and affectionate insults, and they give her the chance to shove all of that deep down to deal with later. For now, she just wants to be with her friends.

“We missed you,” Clarke tells Monroe as she and Raven squeeze her in a hug.

“Yeah, yeah, you too,” Monroe says. “Don’t make me drop the pizza.”

They settle into the living room, balancing plates on their laps.

“So. You’re looking rounder,” Monroe says, eyeing Clarke.

Clarke grimaces at her. “I’m gaining a pound a week at this point. You’re looking...paler.”

“I didn’t think it was possible,” Raven says, and stuffs a huge bite of pepperoni and olive pizza into her mouth.

Monroe shrugs. “Ireland was cloudy.”

“Did you see your grandparents?” Clarke asks.

Monroe sighs. “Yeah. I mean, I was happy to see them, but we ended up having to do family stuff almost half the trip. I’d much rather have been locked in our hotel room, honestly.”

“What did they think about Murphy?” Raven asks, wiggling her eyebrows.

She smiles. “They liked him. I mean, his last name is Murphy, so that automatically gets him bonus Irish points. And he’s, like, stupid in love with me and it showed.”

“At least you match,” Clarke says. “Really, you’re kind of embarrassing yourself with all that ooey-gooey love all over your face.”

“Fuck off,” Monroe says brightly, and they all laugh.

“What’s he doing right now?” Clarke asks curiously. The newlyweds had already been back a couple days, though they’d been staying at home to rest as they readjusted to the time zone.

“Sleeping. Even with the family obligations, I managed to wear him out,” Monroe replies, face smug.

Raven whistles and throws an olive at Monroe. “Details or it didn’t happen!”

“I think the saying is ‘pics or it didn’t happen,’” Clarke says.

Monroe shrugs, a wicked grin on her face. “I have both.”

They catch up, talking more about Monroe’s trip, and Clarke learns more than she ever needed to know about how married life is treating Murphy. Then, as the pizza is demolished, leaving only empty, greasy cardboard and a couple stray olives, the talk turns to Clarke.

“What’s the deal with your baby-daddy?” Monroe says, tucking her feet up under her on the couch, voice eager. “You were a very stingy texter while I was gone, by the way. It was rude.”

Clarke sticks her tongue out. “I didn’t want to interrupt anything…private,” she says.

“Yeah, well—” Monroe pauses. “Actually, thanks.”

Raven snickers as Monroe urges again, “So?”

“Yeah, Clarke,” Raven says. “Tell Monroe _all_ about the baby-daddy.”

Clarke shifts a little in her seat. “He’s…good.”

Monroe scoffs. “Good? What the hell is that supposed to mean? Like, what, good-looking? Good-natured?”

“Good in bed?” Raven adds suggestively.

“No!” Monroe gasps, looking between them. “Already?”

“I—” Clarke tries to say.

“Damn. Nice one, Griffin,” Monroe says. “So how does he rate? Like, scale of one to ten, is he—”

“I haven’t slept with him!” Clarke yells. Well, not since Halloween, at least. 

Monroe blinks owlishly at her as Raven dissolves into laughter. “Well, why not?” she says eventually.

“What is it with you two?” Clarke asks the ceiling. “Is it your mission in life to get me laid?”

“Isn’t there a thing where people in happy relationships want to help single people get into happy relationships?” Monroe asks Raven. “I feel like that’s a thing. Like I read a study somewhere.”

“It’s a thing,” Raven agrees.

“I hate you,” Clarke tells them, crossing her arms defensively. “And you’re being weird. My whole life is _already_ weird. I don’t need to make it weirder.”

Monroe purses her lips, and Clarke resigns herself to fending off more questions about _why she’s not tapping that_ from both of her friends (and, if she’s honest, from her own mind).

But instead, Monroe just asks, “Your texts sucked. Tell me how you told him. And start at the beginning.”

Her foot stretches out along the couch and nudges Clarke’s knee until Clarke gives her a little smile.

“Well, when we went back to Grounders he still had my crown.”

* * *

Later, when Monroe’s all caught up on everything (“ _Seventeen_ avocados? Holy shit!”) and Clarke's told both of them about what happened at the art gallery the night before (“Seriously?” Raven had complained. “Fuck, why do I miss all the crazy stuff?”), Clarke lets her hand rest on her belly.

She hasn’t felt the baby move yet—at least, she doesn’t think she has, because the books say it can be kind of hard to tell it’s the baby at first—but she’s trying not to focus on that. Besides, she’s only eighteen weeks. Most of the things she’s read say first pregnancies usually take longer to feel movement.

“He asked about my parents,” Clarke admits softly. They’d eaten sundaes after the pizza had settled, and they’re all sitting around in a quiet, companionable post-ice cream haze.

Her friends are quiet for a moment.

“Have you told your mom yet?” Raven asks eventually. She’d met Abby Kane several times during their college years, usually when Clarke refused to talk to her mother and Abby contacted Raven to ask how Clarke was doing.

One of the only points of contention in Clarke and Raven’s friendship has always been Raven’s insistence that Abby just wants what is best for Clarke, and Clarke should be grateful. It used to drive Clarke up the wall until Monroe had quietly pointed out that Raven’s own mother probably didn’t even remember her _birthday_ , let alone care enough about her daughter to find out who her friends were and ask about her. Since then, Clarke’s tried to let Raven’s occasional comments slide.

“No.” Clarke taps her fingers on her belly, trying to pick out the beat of the Hozier song stuck in her head rather than look up and see the furrow in Raven’s brow.

“Clarke…”

“I will,” she says. Eventually. She talks to her mother rarely since she graduated, and hasn’t seen her in person at all.

Clarke probably could have told her over their perfunctory Christmas day phone call, but she just hadn’t been able to think of what to say, or how to say it. She’s not looking forward to giving her mother yet another thing to add to her list of Ways Clarke Griffin Is A Disappointment.

She changes the subject. “Did you know he raised his sister?”

“Shit. Really?” Monroe asks.

“Yeah. He had custody of her after their mom died.” A lot of responsibility, she thinks. Making sure a teenager graduates high school, gets through college. Octavia had mentioned being married for only the last couple of years, and Clarke feels kind of guilty when she considers how little time that is for Bellamy to have been able to finally experience responsibility-free adulthood.

_Your little sister has barely left home and now you’ve got a kid on the way! Surprise!_

“Wow. You sure know how to pick your random hook-up impregnator,” Monroe says in an admiring tone.

“Shut up,” Clarke laughs.

But, yeah.

She could have done a whole lot worse.

And though she has a lot to learn about Bellamy Blake, she’s not so sure she could have done much better.

Which is why she kicks out blindly until she hits Raven, interrupting the woman’s quiet chant of, “ _Bang him, bang him, bang him._ ”

Clarke refuses to mess this up.

* * *

Her conviction to keep her hormones under control and her thoughts about Bellamy strictly friendly (coparent-y?) is seriously tested almost immediately. That night she wakes up, overheated skin damp with sweat, with the dream memory of Bellamy’s clever fingers buried in her slowly drifting away even as her body continues to throb.

“Shit,” she whispers into the dark. When they’d had sex on Halloween, there hadn’t been time for him to use his fingers on her, in her, like that—not that she had minded, because he did so well even without them.

But her sleeping brain apparently wondered, imagined, what it would feel like.

What he could make her feel like.

(Okay, her waking mind had also entertained the thought once or twice before chasing it away, but come  _on._ Those long, dexterous fingers, with the calluses she had felt on his fingertips when he'd held her hand at The Dripship? How could she  _not_ wonder?)

Clarke sucks in a long, slow breath. The air in her bedroom is cool, winter still keeping temperatures low, and she wills her body to cool as well.

It resists; every inhale has her peaked breasts shifting against the fabric of her sleep camisole, and it takes every ounce of self control that Clarke possesses to not rub her thighs together where her flesh is still tingling.

It seems—weird, a little bit, to have dreamed like that about Bellamy.

(Clarke ignores the mental voices clamoring about it seeming all too  _right_.)

She needs to keep it reasonable. They need to be partners. Coparents.

She doesn’t need to make it weird with vivid sex dreams about him and his stupid, strong-looking, long-fingered hands.

Though Clarke figures it’d probably be weirder to have sex dreams about someone else, given the fact that he fathered the child she’s carrying.

“Stop,” she tells herself firmly, but it’s a long time before she falls back to sleep.

* * *

But it happens again the next night.

And the next.

She’d known to expect vivid dreams from her pregnancy books, but her dream about being unable to find nutella in the grocery store had nothing on these new ones. They’re bright, detailed, long—and she remembers almost every single detail about them, instead of the dreams disappearing from her mind almost as soon as she wakes.

It’s frustrating enough, trying to text Bellamy normally while stuffing down the dream memories of his hands on her, his mouth on her, him _in_ her.

But she’s getting progressively more hot and bothered, and now she’s cranky with sleep deprivation to boot.

It's gotten so bad that when Murphy texts her, apparently after Monroe filled him in on Clarke's most recent baby drama, asking  _do you want me to end the guy_ _NOW_ , she considers telling him yes just because she's tired and irrationally irritated by the very concept of Bellamy Blake. 

But instead she texts back _no_ with a long string of emojis that she knows he hates.

_i don't know what the fuck that means_

_does that mean you want me to end the sister_

_she sounds like a piece of work_

_i'm not picky_

Clarke snorts aloud at that one, but convinces him that he doesn't need to 'end' anybody at the moment.  

Raven even notices later that day when they watch a new Netflix show, and she catches Clarke glaring daggers at the screen during the steamy sex scene.

“Jesus. What did they ever do to you?” she asks.

“Nothing,” she grits out, and hugs her throw pillow grumpily.

“If you’re not going to bang Bellamy, maybe you should take a little me-time,” Raven suggests; Clarke throws her pillow at Raven’s head.

It’s not that Clarke is opposed to _me-time_ , as Raven puts it. She’s a firm believer in a woman’s ability and right to make herself feel good.

But since Bellamy walked back into her life, well. Before, Clarke could guess whose face might pop into her mind in the middle of her fantasy, and it felt a little skeevy, maybe, to take care of her needs with Bellamy as the inspiration.

(Or at least she tries to convince herself of that; mostly, the idea of it sets her entire body on fucking _fire_.)

And now that the dreams have started, she _knows_ just who would take over her mind—who already has.

But honestly, she’s getting desperate. It's now a quarter past two in the morning, she's about to _cry_ she's so tired and needy, and she just needs to fucking get off and sleep. 

She’s managed to keep communicating with him normally over the past few days, she reasons as she listens to the quiet. In spite of the dreams, she’s gotten through texts and a phone call setting up a time for Bellamy to meet all of her friends next weekend. She’s managed not to blurt out that she’s dream-fantasizing about him.

There’s an occasional croak from a frog outside as the moon glows soft through her filmy curtains.

It’s not like she’s jumping him in real life, Clarke thinks. And it’s not like he’d _know._ And really, can she _really_ be blamed?

She really can’t see how anyone _could_ blame her if they got a look at him, and his stupid face and his stupid shoulders and his stupid _freckles_ , and goddamnit.

This is all his fault.

Her heart is thumping hard in her chest when she finally moves, bringing her fingers up to her collarbone. She’s kicked off her blankets, but her body is still way too hot in comparison to her cold room, so her skin is raised in goosebumps all over.

There’s a little bit of guilt lingering in the way her heart races, but most of it is anticipation, wild excitement for the fulfillment of a desire that’s become almost painful to ignore.

She concentrates on breathing as she traces between her breasts, drawing it out with featherlight touches until she finally moves to brush her knuckles across her nipple. Even through her camisole, the light touch is enough to send a jolt of sensation sizzling down to the junction of her legs.

She can't help but imagine Bellamy's hands lingering on her breasts, as if it's the rough callus of his index catching on her nipple instead of her cotton shirt. 

Clarke tries to take her time, draw things out if she’s really going to do this, but she underestimated just how _good_ it would be when she finally gave into the fantasy of Bellamy. It’s barely a moment later when she trails her other hand down over the little swell of her stomach to skirt hesitantly along the edge of her panties. 

His hand would be teasing, not guilty, and he would whisper something into her ear as he touched her. She wouldn't be able to focus on the words, though, just on the way his hot breath hits her skin, and makes her shiver as he toys with the edge of the underwear. 

She remembers the way, all those nights ago, she wiggled out of her underwear so he could fuck her hard against the door in Mount Weather.

“Fuck,” she whispers, and lets her hand slip under the fabric to touch herself.

She’s even hotter there, and it takes almost nothing for her hypersensitized skin to start quivering as she moves her fingers up and down over her wet flesh, dreaming of larger, rougher, darker hands than hers.

Clarke’s breath hitches as she dips her fingers inside, moving in quick shallow strokes; the hand that had been busily plucking at her nipples, imagining Bellamy's mouth there instead, abandons them to rub desperate circles on her clit.

It’s all so good, too good, and as her quiet pants become breathy little moans, as her legs move restlessly while her busy hands draw her higher and higher, she can’t stop imagining her hands are Bellamy’s, that he’s watching her with those eyes dark and deep enough to hold countless worlds, talking to her in that low voice as he concentrates on driving her closer and closer to the edge.

The sinfulness of using him as her fantasy isn’t enough to keep her from whimpering his name, and the second his name slips guiltily from her lips, her orgasm hits her hard and fast. She can hardly breathe as the pleasure blossoms rapidly, her body pulsing and tremoring until her muscles finally go lax, and she melts into her mattress.

Clarke stares up at the ceiling, a single, huge breath gusting out of her lungs. When she pulls her hands out from her underwear, she sets off a dozen more tiny spasms that keep her sated body tingling pleasantly.

Holy _shit._

If just the memory, the fantasy of Bellamy Blake between her thighs sets her off like that, what would the reality do to her now?

She immediately chides herself. A single fantasy in the middle of the night is one thing; imagining _actually_ being with Bellamy is another thing entirely.

Clarke is _not_ going to chance messing things up with him.

 _You are not your hormones_ , she repeats to herself. 

She wakes up, she gets off, she goes to sleep. That’s all there is to this.

And no one else _ever_ needs to know the details.

* * *

Clarke falls asleep almost instantly after that, so the next afternoon she’s feeling much better, well-rested and nearly finished with an illustration of a warrior princess taming a dragon.

Her phone buzzes twice, but she ignores it as she works. But then it starts to ring, and doesn’t stop even when she lets it go to voicemail twice. It can’t be Raven; she’s in a meeting all afternoon, and Monroe’s gone back to work at the firm now that she’s home.  

Clarke huffs and sets down her brush without cleaning it, intending to deal with the caller as soon as possible so she can return to her painting and finish the damn thing.

The phone starts ringing again before she check the texts or see the call history, but it’s not an unknown call.

 _Mrs. Woods_ is the name lighting up her screen, still programmed into her contacts from the school visit.

“Are you kidding me?” Clarke says aloud. Then she sighs and drags a mostly clean cloth over her hands so she doesn’t get paint on her phone when she answers. Clarke may know even less about Octavia Woods than she knows about the woman’s older brother, but it’s obvious that she’s determined.

“Hello?” she says.

“Hi,” Octavia says. Clarke wouldn’t say she sounds _nervous_ , but it’s not the woman’s normal bright tone. “It’s Octavia.”

“Yeah.”

There’s a pause. “Look, I want to talk to you, but I don’t really want to do it over the phone. Can I meet you somewhere?”

“No,” Clarke says, glancing at her work in progress. “I’m kind of in the middle of something.”

She hears a sigh, and Clarke gives in. She may not like Octavia’s actions, but like Bellamy said when they met for coffee—she’s kind of stuck with his family for life, now.

“You can come over if you want,” Clarke says. “If you don’t mind me working while you talk to me.”

“Really?” Octavia’s voice is bright again. “No, that would be fine. I’m just leaving work, though, so it’ll take me a little while to get there.”

“Fine,” Clarke says, and gives Octavia her address.

When the doorbell rings fifteen minutes later, Clarke forces herself to answer the door immediately rather than making Octavia wait. The woman’s in jeans and boots, with a leather jacket Clarke would kill for. Behind her on the street is a bright, shiny motorcycle.

“Wow,” Clarke says unintentionally. That has Octavia raising a questioning eyebrow, making Clarke flush.

 _You have no reason to blush,_ she tells herself sternly. Only then she remembers that, actually, she does have a reason to blush, given that she’s face to face with the little sister of the man she fantasized about the night before.

“Come in,” Clarke says hastily, stepping to the side and shoving that thought to the back of her mind.

“Thanks,” Octavia replies. “For letting me come over. I know I acted like a total freakazoid last week.”

“You did,” Clarke agrees. “Can I get you anything to drink?”

“Actually, that would be great,” Octavia says hesitantly. “It’s been a long time since my lunch period.”

Clarke heads into the kitchen, aware of Octavia trailing behind her and taking in her things, her house.

“Mint julep okay?” she asks, pulling the pitcher out of the fridge.

“Mint julep?” Octavia sounds alarmed, and Clarke glances back to catch the other woman’s concerned expression.

“Bourbon-free,” she clarifies dryly. “Bellamy—your brother suggested it.”

“Oh.” Octavia smiles. “That sounds like him.”

She pours them both glasses, then leads the way back to her studio.

“I need to finish this,” she announces, settling in front of her paints. “Sit wherever you can find room.”

Octavia carefully shifts a bin of half-empty paint tubes off of the butterfly chair in the corner, but instead of sitting she approaches Clarke.

“That’s really good,” she says, peering over Clarke's shoulder. “Wow.”

“I _do_ make my living from it,” Clarke says, and switches to one of her finest brushes to start the detail work. “A pretty good living. All by myself. No need for help from anyone.”

Octavia backs away at that, plopping down in the chair.

“I figured that out pretty fast,” she says, but her voice isn’t repentant. “I will say I’m sorry if I made you uncomfortable or hurt your feelings. You seem pretty cool, and I’d like to get to know you more. But I’m never going to be sorry for trying to protect my brother.”

Clarke doesn’t speak until she’s finished the teeny, tiny eyelashes of the warrior, and started detailing out the individual scales on the dragon. “I accept your apology. I like you, Octavia. I think you might be a little crazy, but I like you. But I don’t intend on hurting your brother,” Clarke adds. “So you don’t need to worry about protecting him from me.”

Octavia gives her a long, considering look, followed by a not-unfriendly smile. “Yeah. I hope you’re right.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So my normal word count goal for each chapter is ~3500, and this one clocked in at 4616! AND I've already got started on part eight! :D I know this one didn't have any real life Bellarke interaction, but don't worry. Bellamy's POV is coming up, and there will be plenty. ;) Let me know your thoughts if you get a chance! <3


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bellamy briefly contemplates fratricide, but attends a party instead.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I felt guilty about the lack of Bellarke interaction last time, I really did. So, AHEAD OF SCHEDULE, have another extra long chapter with our favorite adorable emotional mess! :D
> 
> ALSO: my sincere thanks to everyone who participated in the Bellarke Fanfiction Awards over at Tumblr, especially if you voted for Build Some Dreams! This fic won first place for Best Pregnancy Fiction, and I'm honestly kind of overwhelmed and amazed. <3

Bellamy doesn’t know what he expected when he surreptitiously pulls his phone out when it buzzes in the middle of happy hour, but it definitely isn’t a text from Clarke with a picture of his sister and the words _I’ve got a visitor._

“Are you alright?” Miller sounds alarmed, which catches Bellamy’s attention; Miller _never_ sounds alarmed.

“I—” he tries to say, and realizes he had stopped breathing when he saw the text. He has to suck in air before he can talk. “My sister is ruining my life.”

“Shit, Bellamy, I thought you were having a goddamn stroke,” Miller calls over the clamor of the bar, disgruntled.

“My sister is ruining my whole fucking life,” Bellamy repeats. “Why is this happening.” He looks beseechingly at his friend. “ _Why._ ”

Miller looks at him askance, then sighs as he starts pulling a pint. “What did she do this time?”

“She’s talking to Clarke. Behind my back. _Again_.”

Miller’s reaction to Bellamy admitting he’d knocked up the pretty tiara-wearing blonde had been to take in Bellamy’s expression for a long moment, then shrug and offer his fist for bumping. He didn’t ask much about Clarke, but he had brought in a few minty virgin drink recipes in the weeks since Bellamy had sheepishly admitted that he was collecting them for her.

“Monty suggested them,” he had said gruffly. “He said they should help if she feels sick.”

Bellamy had wisely decided to let his friend’s grudging kindness pass unremarked; after all, Bellamy is well aware of how pathetic he is quickly becoming over matters relating to Clarke Griffin, and there’s that whole thing about pots and kettles.

Miller slides a trio of beers to a group of women, then claps his hand on Bellamy’s shoulder.

“You need to calm your shit,” he says. “Or you’re going to look like a grandpa before your kid’s even born.”

“What?”

“Seriously, man. You’re giving yourself wrinkles and grey hair and shit.”

“Fuck off,” Bellamy mutters, brushing Miller’s hand off. “I’m fine.”

“You want me to call Mrs. Green? She can give you a friends and family discount on a dye job.”

Bellamy gives his friend the finger, and Miller snickers as he works on a whole lineup of mojitos.

“I’m taking my fifteen,” he says, relishing the panic that briefly flits over Miller’s face at the idea of Bellamy taking his break during the busiest part of happy hour. “Have fun.”

He smiles absently at a group he has to squeeze through in order to duck into the employees-only back room, and it dawns on him that only a few weeks ago he would have lingered, flirted, maybe gotten a number or two.

But now all he can think about is Clarke, and making sure his sister isn’t ruining anything for them.

Not that there’s anything between him and Clarke for Octavia to ruin. They’re just…

Fuck. He has no idea what they are; all he knows is it’s rapidly becoming obvious to him that he wants more.

Is it okay to want more in their situation? If he had just randomly met Clarke again after Halloween, he wouldn’t hesitate.

But there’s more binding them together now than random chance meetings. There’s a kid, a baby, and Bellamy wants Clarke, but he wants that baby too.  

He scowls at the picture of his sister, then hits Clarke’s number with a vicious jab of his thumb.

She answers after a couple rings. “Hello?”

“Do I need to come over?” he asks immediately. “I can; it just might take me a while to find a tarp to wrap up the body.”

There’s a pause, and then Clarke starts laughing so hard she even snorts once.

“What?” he hears faintly in the background. “What’s so funny?”

“I’m going to _murder_ you, Octavia!” he yells into the phone.

There’s a yelp as Clarke stops laughing, and—god, he’s an idiot. She’s the one holding the phone, and he just screamed into her ear.  

“Sorry,” he says, cringing.

Clarke’s voice is still amused when she replies. “It’s okay. And no, you don’t need to come over. Aren’t you at work, anyway? How are you calling me?”

“I took my break,” he mutters. “What the hell is my sister doing there?”

“You’re a tattletale,” he hears Octavia tell Clarke.

“Tell her she’s dead,” he urges Clarke. “Really.”

“Bellamy, I think you’re overreacting a bit,” Clarke replies.

“Really? My sister didn’t arrive at your house unannounced to bug you _again_?”

A beat. “Well, technically, I invited her.”

That makes absolutely no fucking sense, but at the same moment, he starts to truly calm down for the first time since he saw that text. “What? Why?”

“Well…”

“Clarke?”

“She might have texted me a few times. And then called,” Clarke admits.  

Bellamy groans. “How many times?”

“Does it really matter?”

“Fuck,” he says. “I’m sorry.”

There’s rustling on the other line, a low murmur of voices. When she speaks again, her voice is kind of echoey.

“Sorry, I went into the bathroom to talk. But Bellamy…it’s okay, alright? I didn’t mean to freak you out or anything with that text.”

“No, you’re right.” He sighs, rubbing his forehead. “I shouldn’t have freaked out. I just don’t want her to mess things up. Mess them up _more_ , I guess.”

“For the record,” she says softly, “she’s growing on me. But even if she wasn’t, you wouldn’t have to worry about it…about things between us getting messed up. I’d like you even if I hated your family. Which I don’t.”

“Okay. Okay, good,” he says. There’s a moment of silence. “I like you too.”

“Good,” she says, and he can hear the smile in her voice. “Now I’ve got a painting to finish, and your sister has been here for, like, an hour, so I’m going to go kick her out.”

“An hour?” Bellamy repeats. What the hell have they been doing for an hour?

“Yeah. She apologized, and we talked a little bit about my work, her work, you, Lincoln—”

“Wait—me?”

“Uh,” Clarke says.

Just then, Miller pokes his head into the back room. “Come _on_ , Blake! Your fifteen’s turned into twenty; I’m drowning out here!”

“Sounds like you should go,” Clarke says. “I’ll talk to you later, okay?”

“Clarke,” he tries, but all he hears is a quick goodbye, and then dead air as she ends the call.

“You couldn’t wait thirty more seconds,” he grumbles as he takes his place behind the bar. “I could fire you, you know.”

Miller rolls his eyes and holds up a hand; Bellamy tosses him the bottle of simple syrup he needs for the lemondrop. “Bite me.”

* * *

By the time he gets another chance to check his phone, it’s too late for him to justify calling or texting Clarke. He locks up and says goodnight to Miller, and trudges to his own car, wondering—not for the first time—if he should keep working at Grounders.

He’s worked there for years, so it’s not that he dislikes bartending, and the slight pay raise that comes with being manager means that he’s not destitute or anything, but when he does work the hours are long and late.

That didn’t really matter when he was single, only dating casually, with no commitments other than once a week grad classes and work.

Now—well, now he’s still single, he guesses, but Clarke’s not exactly able to come hang out with him at the bar till two in the morning, not that he’d ask her to. And it just seems more responsible, kind of, to try and get a job with hours that line up more with hers.

He tries to convince himself it’s for the kid, so he doesn’t miss things like dinner and bathtime and bedtime, because even when Aurora worked three jobs when he was little, she would make it home for those things more times a week than she didn’t. And that’s what he remembers most about growing up. Not that money was tight, and even tighter when Octavia was born, or that his mother was always tired, even when she smiled at him and read to him from the old mythology books he used to pore over until the pages fell away from the spine.

And it’s not a lie. He wants to be there for the kid. He _really_ wants to be there.

But even though they’ve barely started to get to know each other, and haven’t even touched the idea of what’s going to happen logistically when the baby is born, he also really just wants to be there for Clarke.

He hopes he gets to be there for Clarke.

* * *

The next day is Friday, which means the elementary school has a minimum day, so he has time to catch his sister before he has to be at Grounders for his shift.

Octavia halts in her steps and grimaces when she sees him.

“Stalker,” she says as she loads her things into one of the saddlebags.

He barks out a humorless laugh even as he takes her purse and loads it into the other side. “Takes one to know one.”

She doesn’t bother trying to act like she doesn’t know what he’s getting at.

“What? I went over to apologize.”

“And the urge to say you’re sorry just, what? Struck you out of nowhere? Did you have a prophetic dream or something, urging you to apologize before it was too late?”

She rolls her eyes at him. “No, idiot. Amazingly, I’m an adult with a job; yesterday was the first day I didn’t have staff meetings or parents to call.”

He stares at her.

“And both you and Lincoln were working,” she mutters. “Besides, she said I could come over.”

“Octavia,” he groans.

“Oh, don’t _Octavia_ me,” she says, mimicking his voice in a highly unflattering way. “Have you even listened to yourself over the last week? You’ve been the mopiest mother—” Octavia pauses, glances around at the scattering of schoolchildren still in the process of being picked up. “Motherfudger I’ve ever had to deal with.”

He sputters for a minute, and Octavia bumps him out of the way so she can straddle her bike.

“You do realize you spent at least half of dinner on Tuesday analyzing what it means when people keep using ‘you’ instead of the letter ‘u’ in text conversations, right?”

He doesn’t remember that. He remembers the enchiladas Lincoln made, the margaritas Octavia had insisted Bellamy mix for them. He remembers asking Lincoln about how the rest of the showcase went after he had left, and—okay, he does remember asking none-too-subtly about how well Lincoln knows Clarke, but that’s a normal topic of conversation for when you find out your brother-in-law is acquainted with the woman you impregnated.

Right?

But _moping_ and freaking out over _texting_ , no. Those are not things Bellamy Blake does.

“You checked your phone about a million times,” Octavia adds. “And then you looked like a sad little puppy when you didn’t have new texts.”

Maybe not.

“Just—cool it, okay, O?” he says weakly.

She shrugs, pulls her helmet on. “You’re overreacting. Clarke and I are totally cool now.”

“ _O._ ”

She heaves a dramatic sigh, reaches out and pats his arm. “Sure, Bell. All future hangouts with your baby mama will be initiated by her, okay?”

He doesn’t particularly care for her patronizing tone, but then she starts her motorcycle, chirps, “See you Sunday!” and roars away.

“Sunday?”

* * *

_why did my sister say she’ll see me sunday?_

Bellamy had agonized over whether or not he should just drop by Clarke’s house; the school was only a few minutes away, and honestly, passing up any reasonable chance to see her in person sounds like the worst idea ever.

But she’d already been ambushed by his sister the day before, no matter what Octavia claimed about being invited, and he doesn’t want to overwhelm her or make her think Blakes have no concept of boundaries.  

When the little ellipsis pops up, indicating she’s typing a response, and his stomach seems to kind of flop, he admits, yes, he’s just as pathetic about texting as Octavia had claimed.

At least when it comes to Clarke.

And her texts since the gallery incident _haven’t_ seemed as frequent, or as casual, even if she had said things between them were okay. Sue him for being concerned.

Her reply pops up on the screen silently, because he had kept tapping the phone to keep it from going dark as he waited.

Yeah. He’s that far gone.

_i told her she could come to my house for the meet/greet thing with my friends. seems smart to just get it all over with at once instead of dragging it out._

Almost immediately, another text follows.

_u should invite your friends too! your people meeting my people_

He sets his mouth as his mind races, trying to think of who he can call in to cover for Miller. He’d already arranged for Sunday off for himself while he meets Clarke’s friends, but Miller’s on shift.

But he’s not going to show up with just his sister now that Clarke’s told him to bring his friends.

 _sure_ , he texts back, for once glad that it’s so hard to translate emotion over text as he purposefully aims for a casual response. _i’ll ask them._

_great :)_

Bellamy sighs, then starts to text Miller.

Yeah. Great.

* * *

Bellamy calls Dax and gets him to trade shifts with Miller, and bribes Miller with being able to bring Monty along as long as he comes to Clarke’s that weekend.

“Are you trying to make it look like you have more friends?”

“Monty’s my friend,” Bellamy says defensively.

“That means nothing. Monty’s everybody’s friend. Monty’s friends with the feral cat that lives in the park,” Miller replies.

“Shut up.”

Late Sunday afternoon, he shows up at Clarke’s a nearly a full hour early, but really, it’s not like he’s _anxious._ It’s just that somehow this little gathering has turned into a full-on party, and Bellamy has fucking manners, alright? It’s only polite to help out with set-up and stuff when a handful of the people coming are technically his people.

He juggles the bags of groceries and the twelve-pack of ginger ale so he can knock on her door. The faint hum of music can barely be heard, and he’s trying to figure out what song it is when the lock clicks and Clarke opens the door.

She’s the fanciest he’s seen her since Monroe’s bachelorette party, and for a second he can’t quite figure out how to speak properly. She was dressed nicely at Lincoln’s showcase, he guesses, but in all fairness he was too distracted by the shitshow that followed to be able to properly appreciate her appearance.

Now she’s wearing a little black dress and lacy tights, and her hair is wound up in a twist, but little stray curls are already springing free. Her feet are bare, and he can see through her stockings that her toes are painted a minty green.

It’s adorable.

“I like your toes,” he says, and then wants to die because the first thing he says to her face in a week is about her fucking feet.

She just smiles. “It’s March,” she says. “Green seemed right.” She tries to take the ginger ale out from under his arm, and he frowns at her, holding the case of soda tighter.

“You shouldn’t be carrying heavy stuff.”

“Oh, come on,” she says, grinning and holding out her hands. When he doesn’t move, her mouth drops open a little. “Are you—seriously? It’s soda, Bellamy!”

He shrugs.

“I’m pretty sure I can handle it,” she says.

“That’s okay. I’m already handling it,” he says. “But I might drop it if you don’t let me inside.”

Clarke huffs, but waves him inside.

“You’re the first one here,” she says unnecessarily as he unloads the bags in the kitchen. “And Raven’s still getting ready.”

He nods; she adds, apparently grudgingly, “Thanks for the ginger ale.”

“You’re welcome.” He debates whether or not to reveal that he’s a pathetic loser. But he’s already complimented her toes, why not go all out. “If you like Canada Dry better, I’ve got some in my car.”

“You—” she blinks at him. “Are you for real?”

He lifts and drops one shoulder. “Whatever.”

He’s surprised when she grasps that same shoulder, stands on her tiptoes to plant a kiss on his cheek.

Clarke Griffin and her goddamned cheek kisses are going to be the fucking death of him, he realizes grimly, even as his heart speeds up and he tries his best to keep a giddy smile off his face.

“You’re sweet,” she declares, and he doesn’t think he’s imagining that her cheeks are tinted a little pink.

Well, okay. Bellamy can deal with Clarke’s cheek kisses if she’s actually _blushing_ when she kisses him.

(Should he be this excited that giving him cheek kisses makes her blush? What, _exactly_ , does it mean that she’s blushing?)

“I’m not that sweet,” he says. “I just like to be prepared.”

She glances at him with a wry smile. “Boy scout?”

He grins and gives her a three-fingered salute. “Absolutely not.”

Bellamy fills a little tub that Clarke produces with the ice he brought, setting it up on the table and filling it with drinks. As Clarke sorts through the other groceries and starts putting together veggie platters and meat and cheese trays, he squeezes lime and muddles mint in a glass, topping it off with ginger ale.

“Here,” he says, setting it front of her on the counter.

She glances up at him. “What is it?”

“Moscow mule. Without the moscow.”

She takes a sip, smiles.

Someone knocks on the door in a haphazard pattern before letting themselves in, and Bellamy follows Clarke to the entryway to see who’s there. He doesn’t need to hear Clarke greet her to recognize the ginger immediately.

“We brought cake!” Monroe says, pointing over her shoulder where a guy—her new husband, he assumes—is following with a pink pastry box in his arms. He looks vaguely pissed off, which Bellamy can respect, except when Monroe squeezes Clarke in a hug. Then he looks a little less pissed, his expression actually kind of soft, which Bellamy can understand, too.

Then the guy’s gaze lands on him, and the scowl settles back on his face.

“You’re lucky I didn’t end you,” he says in a low voice.

Bellamy raises an eyebrow, but before he can respond, Clarke’s taking the cake out of Murphy’s hands and pulling him into a one-armed embrace.

Bellamy tells himself it’s stupid to be jealous of the guy currently holding Clarke in a careful hug, given that he’s married to one of Clarke’s best friends and there’s no way anything could ever be happening between them.

But he’s still jealous. Just a little.

“Come in,” Clarke urges. “There’s a crapton of food in here. Eat it.”

Clarke bustles around the kitchen, pouring drinks for her friends. Monroe’s just asking him about his job when Clarke lets out an outraged noise.

“Really? _Really_?” He glances and sees her glaring into the open pastry box. Bellamy crosses over to her, peeks over her shoulder curiously.

The cake is frosted purple, and the words iced onto the top read _Congratulations On Your Accidental Pregnancy!!_

Monroe shrugs when they lift their heads to stare at her. “What? You need a reason to throw a party. It’s too early for this to be a baby shower, and _Congratulations On Introducing The Guy Who Impregnated You To All Of Your Friends So People Stop Thinking He’s Imaginary_ was too long to put on a cake. So. Yay!”

Clarke sighs heavily. “Bellamy, this is Monroe Stuart, also known as the worst friend in existence.”

“You love me,” Monroe declares.

“And this is John Murphy, her husband,” Clarke continues as if Monroe never spoke.

“Murphy,” the man emphasizes gruffly.

Clarke reaches out and pats Murphy on the arm.

“Everybody except for Monroe is required to call him Murphy,” she explains to Bellamy. “It’s not you.”

“It’s kind of you,” Murphy says.

Clarke glares, and Bellamy brushes his knuckles along her arm so she looks at him.

“It’s alright,” he tells Clarke.

Raven finally emerges from the back of the house at that point, and Murphy's distracted from his apparent hatred of Bellamy as he greets her. Raven gives Bellamy a quick smile with an alarming amount of teeth, and he's not ashamed to admit he scoots closer to Clarke. Things go quickly after that as more and more people start arriving. Bellamy guesses he can only be grateful it’s at Clarke’s house; though it’s not a mansion by any means, it’s still roomier than his tiny apartment. He can fit about four people into his living room before it starts feeling claustrophobic.

He and Wick greet each other with only a little awkwardness after Raven finishes making out with the scruffy man. His sister and Lincoln show up, and Bellamy holds his breath as both Monroe and Raven eye Octavia skeptically, but then Murphy notices Lincoln's tattoo on his forearm, and his comment is enough for all of them to get wrapped up into an in-depth discussion of tattoo styles.

Someone turns up the music, and it almost feels like a date, like he and Clarke are together, as he sticks by her side as he gets to know her friends and she gets to know his.

The most awkward moment of the evening is, surprisingly, due to Monty's presence. In Bellamy's experience, everybody loves Monty.

But when Miller and Monty make their way in hesitantly after someone yells to come in when they knock, Monty's eyes widen while Clarke blushes a little.

"Hi," Clarke says. "Um, you're friends with Bellamy?"

Monty at least doesn’t clarify that he’s there more in a boyfriend-on-Bellamy’s-friend capacity, and nods.

“How, uh, how are you?” he asks.

She looks embarrassed. “I’m good.” She takes a breath. “No STDs, in case you wondering. Well, except for a fetus.”

Bellamy stares at Clarke, and she mutters, “He was my nurse.” When he just frowns, she sighs and adds, “At the gynecologist's. After Halloween. When I was worried I got an STD or something.”

“Oh,” Bellamy says.

Clarke strokes a hand over her belly, and Monty smiles. “I’m glad you’re doing well,” he says. “And congratulations.”

The smile that spreads across her face is small, but radiant.

Bellamy thinks she looks beautiful.

* * *

All in all, it could go worse. His sister appears to bond with Clarke’s friends, and Bellamy doesn’t know whether to be afraid or glad. He endures his own interrogation on and off throughout the night, but Clarke sticks by his side, and that means it’s never too bad.

At one point, Clarke’s cup is empty, and he slips away to get her a refill only to run into Murphy at the stretch of counter where the drinks are set up, doing the same.

Murphy glares at him; Bellamy raises an eyebrow.

Miller elbows them both out of the way, mixes a couple drinks while they’re both still gaping, and rolls his eyes at them as he walks away.

Bellamy watches his friend hand Clarke a virgin mojito, and sighs when she beams at him.

He guesses he can’t be mad that Miller likes Clarke, or that Clarke likes Miller.

It’s kind of the whole point of this evening.

As the night wears on, and the food disappears, and everyone except Clarke and Bellamy (who’s staying sober out of solidarity) becomes tipsier, there’s laughter and jokes and even some dancing to the music blasting out of the little bluetooth speaker on the counter.

Clarke sways to the beat next to him, and it’s almost like dancing with her at Mount Weather again.

Except they’re not about to sneak into the back and have a quickie in a storeroom.

Which, he figures, is a good thing. They’re establishing a friendship first or whatever.

But he’d be lying if he said that he didn’t dream about it sometimes.

Being with Clarke again. That way.

Once the cake is cut and eaten, and Bellamy cracks a smile as pretty much everyone laughs at his and Clarke’s expense, Clarke leans into his side more and more, and when she sways it becomes less about moving to the beat of a song and more about wavering on her feet in exhaustion. When she almost loses her balance, Bellamy stops hesitating and loops an arm around her waist, holding her up.

“You want to tell everyone to go home?” he asks. It’s not particularly late for the average adult, but he imagines it feels much later to a woman who’s busy forming another human being.

She shakes her head, leans even more heavily into him. “No,” she says, her voice slurring with sleep. “They’re still having fun.” She yawns hugely. “Need to lie down, though.”

Since she doesn’t seem inclined to move, he wraps his arm a little tighter around her, letting his hand splay across the curve of her belly with a giddy sort of joy.

“Which way?” he whispers in her ear; she mumbles something he doesn’t understand, but points to the hallway.

He quietly leads her through the little clusters of people, catching Raven’s questioning brow and nodding at Clarke, who’s nearly nodding off herself at the moment. Raven tilts her chin in understanding, mouthing the word _upstairs_.

Bellamy’s never gone this far into Clarke’s house; he’s only been in the kitchen and the living room, and once made it as far down the hall as the half-bathroom designated for guests. He passes that bathroom now, a couple more doors beyond it that he imagines are bedrooms. At the very back of the house, next to the staircase, is a half open door. A lamp’s been left on in the room, and he can make out enough to realize the room is full of huge windows looking out onto her backyard, and the tables and easels explain the smell of paint.

“You going to show me your stuff sometime, princess?” he asks, desperately curious. He’s seen the paintings on her walls, and, okay, he’s googled her and looked at a bunch of the books she’s done illustrations for, but it’s somehow different, the idea of her showing him the work before it’s _done_.

“Mm hmm,” she mumbles, eyes closed. “I’ll show you all my stuff.” He pauses on the first step, looking down at her.

It may just be that she’s nearly asleep, but somehow the way she says _stuff_ doesn’t really sound like she’s talking about her _art_ stuff.

“Looking forward to it,” is all he says.

He helps her up the stairs. At the top of the little landing, there’s only one door, and he’s a grown ass man, alright? He’s definitely not freaking out about going into Clarke bedroom or anything.

Clarke reaches out and pushes the door open, but then doesn’t really move, just rests her head against his chest with a sigh. Bellamy’s not sure he’s ever before seen someone so tired they’re acting almost drunk, but that’s where Clarke’s at.

“Don’t fall asleep on me,” Bellamy warns. “I really doubt I’m as comfortable as your bed. Plus you might fall down.”

Clarke grumbles wordlessly; Bellamy sighs and feels around on the wall for the lightswitch.

Her bedroom is big and airy, clearly the master suite of the house, with a big closet and a half-open door revealing a bathroom. Her bed is centered on the opposite wall, covered with a fluffy-looking comforter and a handful of brightly-colored pillows.

“You always this exhausted, or is it just me?” Bellamy asks as he guides her over to her bed.

Clarke flaps a hand in the air as she sits, looking around blearily. “I don’t usually make myself stay up this late any more,” she says, but the words come out slow as she clearly struggles to stay awake enough to answer him.

Bellamy doesn’t mean to brush the hair escaping from her twist out of her eyes, really, but he apparently can’t help it. Maybe she won’t remember.

She blinks heavily at him, and eventually a smile curves her lips.

“You should get some sleep,” he says.

“Kay.”

“Goodnight, Clarke,” he says.

“Night,” she breathes.

He turns to leave before he does something stupid, like kiss her because she looks so sleepy and adorable and beautiful, but he’s only made it a couple of steps down when he hears her call him in a frustrated tone.

“Yeah?” he asks, looking through her doorway. A frown is wrinkling her brow, and her bottom lip is pushed out, almost pouting.

“My hair is all tangled in the pins,” she says. “Can you…can you help me?”

Bellamy looks at her for a moment. “Yeah. Okay.”

“You’ll have to stand up,” he tells her, because he thinks it’s probably a terrible idea to climb on her bed behind her so he can reach her hair. She does, sighing dramatically, but kind of melts against him when he starts easing the pins out of her hair. He’s not quite sure what she did to it, but the pins are in a snarled mess, all hooked together and wound up in knots of hair.

It means he needs to go slow, but he probably goes even slower than he really needs to. But her hair is silky, once he frees each little section and smooths out the tangles with his fingers, and Clarke makes soft little noises whenever his fingers graze her scalp.

Eventually, though, he pulls out the last pin, runs his fingers through her hair checking for any last knots.

“All done,” he says. He pulls his hands away when all they want to do is settle where her neck curves into her shoulders.

“Thanks,” she says, her voice almost slurring, and she flops down on her bed. Bellamy watches, amused, as she snuggles into one of the pillows, one hand curled up next to her cheek, the other tucked around her abdomen.

“Night,” she mumbles, and then she’s asleep.

Bellamy’s chest feels warm and kind of funny as he watches her face relax in slumber, and he wonders if it means anything that she can fall asleep so easily when she knows he’s still standing in her room.

It’s probably just that she’s exhausted, he tells himself. She’s still wearing her party clothes, and she’s passed out on top of her covers.

He glances around, spots a throw blanket draped over the arm of a squishy armchair in the corner of her room. He grabs it and tucks it carefully around Clarke, smiling a little as she lets out another one of those soft little sighs.

“Goodnight, Clarke,” he whispers, and because he wants so badly to kiss her on the cheek, he forces himself to leave.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks so much to everyone who has stuck around through my long breaks between chapters, and especially to those who take the time to offer feedback! I appreciate every reader and every comment so much. I hope you enjoyed this installment, and let me know your thoughts if you get a chance!


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's time for Clarke's doctor's appointment.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, whenever I write about the technical/medical pregnancy stuff, I google like crazy; that being said, if I still make a glaring error that a person having experienced this firsthand notices, please feel free to let me know! 
> 
> I was not expecting this chapter to take the turn it did (YET), but it did, so. Happy reading! ;D

When Clarke drifts awake, she's initially puzzled to realize she's still in her clothes. It's been a really long time since she's slept in her clothes, years probably. Even when she's drunk, she's usually able to strip most or all of the way. Actually, she's even more likely to strip out of her clothes when she's drunk.

But clearly, that's not the case, as the fetus pressing on her bladder makes evident, and Clarke struggles to untangle herself from the afghan wrapped around her like a straitjacket before she pees her pants.

Or tights. Whatever.

She finally manages to free herself and bolts to the bathroom. Once she’s done, she strips completely and gets in the shower.

As she lathers the shampoo in her hair, her fingers slow and she can’t help the smile that grows on her face as she remembers the way Bellamy had helped her with her mess of pins last night. She blames her flush on the heat of the water, though, because she doesn’t _need_ to be embarrassed about it, really. They’re pretty much friends at this point, right? Clarke wouldn’t be embarrassed to ask Raven or Monroe or even Murphy for help with her hair.

Though she’s pretty sure Raven and Monroe and Murphy’s reaction to her needing help with her hair would have been to make fun of her mercilessly while pulling the pins out.

Bellamy had let her lean against him, nearly asleep, and his hands had been so gentle, and even thinking about it now makes her feel all fluttery and warm, which probably isn’t normal for her other friendships either.

They’re just a different type of friend, is all. That’s it.

She finishes cleaning up, running soapy hands over the taut curve of her stomach.

“Hey,” she says, tapping just below her navel. “What are you doing in there? You should probably, like, wiggle around or something. Say hello. It’s only polite.”

Her child doesn’t care about politeness, and Clarke sighs when she feels nothing.

* * *

Her next doctor’s appointment is Friday, and she knows she shouldn’t get her hopes up. Tons of people go in for their twenty week appointment just to be disappointed when the baby is turned in a way that makes it impossible to tell the sex.

The books and internet posts like to say the babies are being “shy,” but it seems more likely to Clarke that they’re being stubborn. And, as already proven by its refusal to move, her baby is _very_ stubborn.

“So we might not be able to tell,” Clarke warns Bellamy. She’s got the phone cradled between her ear and shoulder as she squints at the painting on her easel. She’d gotten a new assignment, one for a young adult fantasy novel. Only the cover art had been commissioned, but the story of the young witch protagonist begged for a deeply intricate scene, little easter eggs from the novel tucked in all throughout.

“I know, Clarke.” His voice is amused. “I can google, too.”

“Don’t try to pretend you didn’t buy a bunch of baby books, Bellamy,” she teases, and switches brushes so she can paint in the fine lines of the witch’s cat’s whiskers.

There’s a pause. “Anyway,” Bellamy says, “I was wondering. Do you…do you want to get dinner or something afterward?”

Clarke’s brush slows. “Dinner?”

“Yeah. You know. Food. Sustenance. Someone else doing the cooking.”

When Clarke doesn’t reply immediately, he keeps talking. “Or you could come over to my apartment, I guess. I could cook. I do that sometimes, and my sister survived so I’m pretty sure I’m decent at it.”

At that, Clarke smiles. “I’ve had your pasta, Bellamy. I know you’re a good cook.”

He clears his throat. “Uh, yeah. Okay. So…”

She lets out a slow breath. “Um. Yeah, we should do dinner. It would be good to talk.”

They haven’t really gotten much time to talk about their situation, just by themselves. Raven interrupted, or all their friends were there, or Bellamy was busy trying to apologize for Octavia’s crazy antics.

It’s silly to be nervous about agreeing to dinner so they can talk uninterrupted.

“Great. Do you want me to pick you up for your appointment?”

It’s on the tip of her tongue to say no, they can just meet up separately, but then the hope in his voice registers with her, and Clarke thinks that this is the first baby thing he’s getting to go to. From the little she’s learned of him, he seems like the type of guy who probably wants to be there for every second possible.

Feeling too guilty now to say no, she agrees. And it’s not like it’s a hardship to spend time with him. He’s nice, and sweet, and…tall.

And really cute, but whatever.

“I’ll see you at four-ish, then?” Clarke asks.

“It’s a date,” Bellamy agrees, then adds hastily, “I mean, not a _date_ -date. Like an appointment-date. Like a—”

He stops talking when Clarke starts snickering.

“I got it, Bellamy,” she says. “I’ll see you then.”

“Yeah, okay. See you then.”  

* * *

When it takes her forty minutes to find something to wear to her doctor’s appointment, Clarke finally concedes that she might need to invest in some bigger maternity clothes. She’d made do with leggings and big sweaters, dresses and tops with empire waistlines, but it’s getting warmer and she’s getting bigger every _fucking_ day.

Clarke takes in a deep, calming breath and tries to let the irritation that comes with trying on seventeen different outfits and hating them all flow out of her limbs.

“Okay. It’s not like he hasn’t seen you in crappy clothes before,” Clarke reasons with herself. She’d dressed for comfort, not to impress that first time he came over to her house.

She has no real reason to need to dress up. It’s not like she’s trying to impress him _now_ , she rationalizes. She has absolutely no reason to be worrying about how she looks. It’s only for her own sense of self-esteem that she’s angsting about her wardrobe. That’s all.

“Fuck,” she snarls, and yanks on her biggest pair of leggings and one of three shirts that still fit her. It had been big enough to still kind of flow when she wore it for Monroe’s bachelorette party, but now it pulls across her middle.

She’s spent way too much time on google image search, and she can rationalize to herself that she’s carrying small compared to some people she sees doing those sideways poses, documenting their size every week.

But she’s definitely not as small as some of them. It’s not even a little bit possible anymore for someone to look at her and not immediately know she’s pregnant.

Clarke doesn’t know what they’re doing after her appointment, whether they’re going to eat or if Bellamy’s going to cook for her, so just in case she throws her hair in a decent braid and puts some studs in her ears.

She surveys her reflection, then blows a raspberry at it before heading downstairs to wait. While she kills time playing on her phone, texts start coming in.

 _i want to know what it is as SOON as you know_ , Raven tells her in the middle of a Trivia Crack round.

It’s sent as a group text, and before she can even respond, Monroe chimes in.

_100 BUCKS SAYS IT’S A BOY!!_

_ps john says to put him down for 50 on not finding out today_

_what a party pooper_

Clarke rolls her eyes and taps out a reply.

_nobody is betting on the sex bc that’s WEIRD and i don’t want to listen to one of you whine about losing $100. i’ll let you know later._

_i’ll take 100 on a girl,_ Raven texts, then a moment later, _oops_ when she must realize she’s still in the group text with Clarke.

The doorbell rings and Clarke pulls herself up from the couch, straightening her clothes as best as she can. She thinks she clears the grumpiness off her face until she answers the door and Bellamy takes one look at her and asks, “Something wrong?”

She huffs and locks the door behind her. “I’m big.”

He considers her. “I mean, you’re still pretty short in my opinion, but—”

She laughs in spite of the weak attempt at a joke, and then she sighs.

“Seriously,” Bellamy says, hand briefly touching her arm. “You alright?”

“I’m fine,” she says. “Just, you know. Out of clothes that actually fit me. I used to be able to wear things that buttoned,” she adds wistfully.

“You look nice,” he says, and opens the passenger door for her. She eyes him as she slides in, but he actually seems serious. So serious he’s frowning slightly, not looking away as he waits for her to respond, and she feels her face start to warm.

“Oh. Um, thanks,” she says, and he finally nods and gets in the car.

* * *

The wait at the doctor’s office isn’t long, which means they’re quickly taken back to an exam room. Monty waves as they pass him in the hall, and Clarke catches him flashing Bellamy a thumbs up.

Bellamy fidgets nervously as the nurse assigned to her today records her vitals, looking away when she steps on the scale as if afraid she’d be upset if he saw. Well, she might be. But she wouldn’t, like, maim him or anything, so his concern is kind of adorable.

Once that’s over, he offers her a very unnecessary hand to assist her up onto the exam table.

She takes it anyway, letting the heat of his palm and the sweetness of his jittery excitement warm her inside and out.

“You nervous?” she asks.

“No. Yes. I don’t know.” She laughs at him and he gives her a crooked smile. “Do you have a preference?”

“I don’t think so,” Clarke says after a moment of thought. “But my friends apparently made bets. Do you?”

He shrugs. “I have experience raising one, and I have experience being the other. I think I’d be good with anything.”

There’s a knock on the door; Dr. Nyko enters the room, chart tucked under his arm.

“Good afternoon, Clarke. Clarke’s friend.”

“Hi,” Clarke says. “Um, this is Bellamy. Blake. He’s my…”

“I’m the…” Bellamy pauses, clears his throat. “Uh, I’m the father.”

Dr. Nyko raises his eyebrows just a hair at that, and Clarke flushes. “Found him,” she says weakly.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you,” is all he says, shaking Bellamy’s hand. “Glad you could come.”

Clarke’s gotten to hear the baby’s heartbeat at all of her appointments; she cried every time. She hopes she manages to hold it together in front of Bellamy, but she has her doubts—this is going to be her first time _seeing_ the baby since her very first appointment. Luckily, Clarke’s gotten to the point in her pregnancy when Dr. Nyko just tells her to shift her pants down and lift her top up instead of having to drape a paper cloth over her naked bottom half, and the ultrasound is the typical sonogram.

There’s no way in hell she would have allowed Bellamy to hang out in the exam room for another one of the transvaginal ones, no matter how guilty she feels about him missing out on so much of her early pregnancy.

Her leggings, though they’re the biggest pair she owns, have left angry red lines where they’re tight on her skin; Bellamy frowns and reaches out to trace the bright indentations with his fingers.

“Do those hurt?” he asks, the careful touch making her feel shivery inside..

“Not really,” she says carefully. “But it feels good to have my leggings rolled down.”

“You weren’t kidding,” he replies, fingers still idly drifting over her skin. “You are getting bigger.” Clarke tenses her body and wills herself not to get goosebumps; her body fails to listen, and she has to gently push his hands away when it doesn’t seem like he’s going to stop before something _really_ embarrassing happens.

“That’s rude,” she tells him tartly.

“You still look nice,” he insists.

“Ready?” Dr. Nyko interrupts, holding up the bottle of ultrasound gel when Clarke and Bellamy both look at him.  

Dr. Nyko warns Clarke the gel is going to be cold, she _knows_ it’s going to be cold, women in movies and on television always complain about it being cold, but still, she can’t help but squeak at the sensation of the frigid substance hitting her skin.

“You alright?” Bellamy asks, voice amused.

She gives him a dirty look, and doesn’t bother to answer as Dr. Nyko starts smoothing the wand over her belly.

“Look,” Clarke says, reaching out blindly; Bellamy catches her hand, squeezes tightly as the images on the monitor comes into focus.

At first it’s just a chaotic jumble of shapes as Dr. Nyko shifts, pressing into Clarke’s belly for a good view of the baby.

And then, she can see the profile of the baby’s head.

Bellamy’s hand tightens even more around hers, and she chances a glance away from the monitor. He’s staring, transfixed, and she’s pretty sure she sees the glassy sheen of tears in his eyes.

But then she has to look back, because Dr. Nyko’s talking them through the measurements he’s taking, and then he’s letting them listen to the baby’s heartbeat, and Clarke’s vision is blurry with tears even though she’s heard it before.

“All of your baby’s measurements look good,” Dr. Nyko says as he records them. “Now, we’re almost done. Based on baby’s development, I’d say you’re right on track for your due date.”

“Okay,” Clarke manages. 

“Are you still planning on learning the sex?” the doctor asks.

Clarke looks over at Bellamy; he squeezes her hand and nods rapidly.

“Yes,” she says. “Please.”

“This is one of my favorite parts with any patient,” Dr. Nyko confides as he angles the wand for a better view of the baby’s pertinent bits. “Baby’s being a little shy, but I think—” He makes a satisfied noise. “There.”

“What is it?” Bellamy asks hesitantly, and Dr. Nyko smiles.

“Congratulations. It looks like you’ve got a little girl.”

Clarke sniffles, tries to hold it in, and then bursts into tears.

It’s embarrassing, but not unexpected. What’s unexpected is when she turns to Bellamy and sees his own overbright eyes, and he takes the hand that had been holding hers, slides it over her cheek so he can catch the tears with his thumb, and presses his lips to hers with a watery laugh.

Clarke sobs into his mouth and pushes her hands into his hair, holding him to her for a kiss that’s much longer and deeper than she imagines Dr. Nyko appreciates being witness to.

Her doctor delicately clearing his throat is what has Clarke finally jerking back, her lips still tingling pleasantly.

Shit. Shit, shit, shit.

“I—uh—sorry,” she settles for saying, feeling the rapid heat fill her cheeks as she wipes at her damp face and stares down at her still-bared belly.

“You’d be surprised at how used I am to it,” Dr. Nyko assures her, and hands her a tissue and a paper towel to start cleaning her belly off with. “You’re not the first couple to be excited about learning their baby’s sex.”

Clarke’s eyes dart to Bellamy, who still looks a little dazed. “Oh, we’re—I mean, we’re not. Together. We’re not a couple.”

She can still taste him on her tongue.

Dr. Nyko pauses, glances. His face is perfectly serene, but Clarke swears she can sense his skepticism. “I apologize. Even so, don’t worry. I’ll print out some of the pictures for you while you clean up,” he says, and closes the exam room door behind him.

Bellamy’s quiet while she fixes her clothes, until he suddenly blurts out, “Why not?”

Clarke pauses. “What?”

He looks a little alarmed, as if he didn’t mean to say anything, but he sets his shoulders and repeats himself anyway. “Why aren’t we a couple?”

She stares at him; a muscle ticks in his jaw as he meets her gaze and waits. “Because we’re not like that.”

“Yeah. But why not?”

“Are you kidding me?” she asks, and the tears that spring to her eyes this time are the hot, angry kind. “Does this seem like a good time or place to have this conversation?”

He looks a little chagrined at that, but shrugs. “I’m sorry. But—we could be. Together. Think of how easy it could be.”

“ _Easy_?” she echoes, disbelieving, and that’s when Dr. Nyko knocks briskly and walks back into the room.

He stops when he sees their tense postures and faces. “Ah, here are your sonogram pictures,” he says slowly, handing them to Clarke. She snatches them and slides them into her purse. “There are multiple copies in there.”

Clarke tries to tuck the anger away, and forces a smile. “Thank you. I appreciate it.”

* * *

Throughout the rest of her appointment and after, Bellamy’s silent and she’s silent in return, even as he helps her with gentle hands down from the exam table, and as she makes her next appointment. She only addresses him once in a clipped voice, asking if he can make it to the time she wants for her twenty-four week exam.

“I’ll make it work,” he says brusquely.

They’re supposed to eat dinner together afterward, and Clarke’s dreading it as they walk to the car.

“Look. I just really want to go home,” she says when he holds the passenger door open for her.

“Really, Clarke?”

“What?” she snaps defensively. “I’m tired.”

“And what about after I take you home?” he asks. “Are you just going to ignore this forever?”

“No. Now please take me home. Or I can call Raven; she’s probably getting off work.”

He closes the door and goes around to climb into his own seat. “I don’t get why you’re mad at me. I mean, apart from in a general sense with the whole accidental pregnancy issue.”

“I’m _not_ mad about that,” she says instantly. “Okay? Don’t say that again.”

“Okay,” he says, voice a little calmer. “Okay. I’m sorry.”

“I’m not mad,” she says, softer. “I just don’t think you’re thinking straight. I’m probably not, either, okay? It was a big day.”

Bellamy’s shaking his head. “No. I mean, yeah, it was big, but. It’s just—look. What are the chances that we’d actually _find_ each other after Halloween?” he says, gesticulating wildly as he talks and making his car keys jingle. “Like, you just _happen_ to find the place where I work, and you’re pregnant, and you’re not seeing anyone and _I’m_ not seeing anyone, and we’re not supposed to think that maybe this was meant to be? That we should at least try, maybe, to be together?”

Clarke groans. “Oh my god, Bellamy. This isn’t a fucking fairy tale, okay? Real life just doesn’t work out like that.”

He frowns. “Okay, but have you actually read the real fairy tales? Because I really wouldn’t want real life to work out like them, or else I’d probably be blinded by a witch for getting you pregnant and then I’d be separated from you for years until we conveniently meet up in the desert and you cry into my eyes, curing my blindness.”

She stares at him. “You…”

Bellamy shrugs. “What? I read.”

“You’re unbelievable,” she decides. “But this isn’t some medieval Rapunzel situation, okay? We’re real people and this is a real baby and this is _real life_ , Bellamy, and fate just doesn’t hand people happy endings.”

“I never said fate handed us a happy ending.”

“‘Maybe this was meant to be,’” she says in a poor approximation of his voice.

He barks a laugh, though it’s not an amused one. “That doesn’t mean I think it’s going to be easy. And even if I _had_ thought that, you’ve already proved me wrong.”

“Bellamy…”

“Clarke, I like you,” he says hurriedly. “And I think you like me, because I don’t think you’d let me go on this long without telling me if you didn’t. And I…I don’t know. Don’t you think we owe it to ourselves to try?”

“I do like you,” she admits. “But I don’t really even know you. You don’t know me, either, not really."

“That’s what dating’s for,” he says, frustrated. “Jesus, Clarke, I’m not saying we should fucking get married tomorrow, okay? I’m saying I want to take you out on dates, I want to hang out with you at home, I just want to try and be with _you._ I should probably also add I’d like to kiss you some more, full disclosure. And before you even say it,” he says, interrupting her when she opens her mouth to speak, “I’d want to try this even if nothing had come of that night at Mount Weather. I’d want to try this because I want _you,_ Clarke, not because I have some weird idea of a perfect Stepford family in my head.”

“I just…” Clarke has to swallow. “I don’t know.”

“Can you at least believe that I wouldn’t leave even if things didn’t work out between us? That I’d still be here for you and the…” He pauses, and she can see his throat work. “And for our daughter , even if wasn’t…like that?”

He watches her steadily, and Clarke thinks about what he’s done over the last few weeks.

She thinks about avocados and ginger ale and hairpins, about the way he looked at the ultrasound monitor, about the way he tasted like salt when he kissed her.

The way his voice sounded almost reverent when he said the word _daughter._

Clarke shakes her head slowly. “I know you won’t leave.”

Bellamy lets out a long breath and starts the car. “Okay. Good. Now, if I promise not to bring it up again for the rest of the day, will you let me feed you? Please?”

“Fine,” she says quietly, and picks at her cuticles as he starts to drive.

What she doesn’t say is that that’s not really what worries her, the threat of him leaving.

What worries her is that she’s pretty certain that if they try, and it doesn’t work, and he _stays_ , it’ll hurt far worse than if he left.

And she just doesn’t know if she can do that, no matter how much she likes him or how attractive he is or how sweet he is about anything to do with her, _their_ , baby.

She just doesn’t know.    

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let me know your thoughts!


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Clarke stays for dinner; Bellamy worries about everything.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for your enthusiastic response to last chapter, and for any help you might have sent in regarding pregnancy, etc.! And thank you for all of your patience. I've been moving out of my apartment, and I'll be finishing that up this weekend, and then I'm starting my new job on Monday! So at least for now job-searching's off the table, and I might feel more inspired to write. :)

Clarke’s silent pretty much the entire way to his apartment. Which is fine, because that means Bellamy has plenty of time to think about what he just did.

Holy shit.

What the _fuck_ did he just do?

Probably just torpedoed any chance at future happiness and having a more-than-coparents relationship with the mother of his daughter because he has no self control and can’t help kissing Clarke or blurting out that he thinks they should be together—

But in spite of how terribly he handled things, and how terribly Clarke reacted, and in general how terrible everything currently is, he can’t help the smile that tugs at the corners of his mouth.

His _daughter_.

He wonders if he would be this psyched if the doctor had told them the baby was a boy; he thinks about it for a few seconds, then decides, yeah, he would be.

He’s just psyched in general. The doctor could have been like, _Oh, hey, looks like the baby is a dinosaur!_ And Bellamy would have been like, wow, cool, that’s awesome, and he would have meant it.

Bellamy pulls into his parking spot, turns off the car. He turns toward Clarke, trying not to search her face for a reaction to his admittedly mediocre apartment complex.

“We’re here,” he says.

“I can see that.” Her voice is cool, and Bellamy sighs.

He opens her door for her, but she ignores the hand he offers her and pushes herself out of the car on her own.

Patience. He just needs to have patience.

Fuck patience.

Clarke might be mad at him, and he might be mad at himself, but jesus christ, it’s not like his actions were the end of the world—and he’s allowed to be mad at her, too.

“This way,” he gestures, and leads her into his apartment.

It’s clean, still smelling like the weird lemony disinfectant he’d gotten when she’d agreed to have dinner with him, and that’s about the best thing he can say about it.

But this is where he lives, and who he is, and there’s no point in trying to lie about the facts.

“Do I need to take off my shoes?” she asks, and he pauses, trying to figure out if she’s sincere or sarcastic.

Amazingly, she seems sincere, and Bellamy can’t help laughing at her.

Immediately, she stiffens and her face closes off. “I was just being polite,” she says primly. “You don’t need to be a jerk.”

“Clarke,” he says. “Look at the floor. Does it look like a floor you need to take your shoes off for?”

He watches her take in the old linoleum of the entryway and kitchen, the stains in the carpet that never come out no matter how many times he gets the carpet cleaned. A faint blush stains her cheeks, but her chin lifts.

“I was being _polite_ ,” she reiterates, and Bellamy has to wonder just how she grew up, where politeness means being careful about wearing shoes on people’s carpets.

“No. Leave your shoes on. Unless you want to take them off,” he adds.

She reaches out, steadying herself with a hand on the wall as she awkwardly bends over to tug off her boots; he’s pretty sure she does it just to spite him.

Her socks are patterned with lemons, and he doesn’t realize they’ve made him smile until she asks, “What?”

“What? Um, nothing. I’ll give you a tour,” he replies. Bellamy holds out a hand so she’ll precede him; she crosses her arms underneath her breasts, which has the unfortunate effect of drawing his attention both to said breasts and to the rounded stomach below.

He clears his throat, points to the right. “So. Kitchen.”

Clarke hums and nods. Bellamy points straight ahead, over her shoulder. “Living room. Where living happens.”

“Riveting.”

“I know.” He points to the left. “My room, and the bathroom, if you need it.”

“I will probably almost definitely need it,” she admits grudgingly. “Actually. Yeah, right now.”

She starts down the hallway, then pauses and turns to him. “Tour over?”

He knows she doesn’t mean it to sting, but it does. “Tour over.” Because it’s all he has.

Bellamy doesn’t want to wait at the end of the hallway for her like a total weirdo, and besides, it’s already after five, and if he’s going to cook, he should get started now so Clarke’s not starving by the time it’s actually ready.

He’d agonized over what to cook; he’d already made avocado pasta for her, which is one of his go-to recipes. He makes pretty good Mexican food, but he’s pretty much the worst at being able to register how spicy something is, and he’d read that a lot of pregnant women suffered from heartburn.

Clarke hadn’t said anything about heartburn, but he figures better safe than sorry.

And that eliminates a lot of other food, at least until he manages to subtly interrogate Clarke about her current pregnancy symptoms.

He pulls out the tray of ingredients he’d prepped earlier that day, then starts buttering bread he slices off a fresh loaf.

There’s a tiny section of counter where he’s managed to fit two barstools, and when Clarke returns to the kitchen that’s where she sits.

“I nearly fell in,” she announces, irritation clear in her voice.

“I…what?”

“I nearly fell in,” she repeats, and Bellamy stares at her, at the little crease between her eyebrows.

“I’m…sorry,” he says slowly, and she sighs.

“You really don’t have women over often, do you?”

He stiffens a little at that. “Not recently. I didn’t think it was the best idea, given the circumstances, but I really don’t know how that’s your business. Considering that topic I'm not talking about right now.”

She ignores that. “I mean, even in the last few years. Has any woman spent a lot of time wherever you lived since your sister moved out?”

He’s opening his mouth to argue, his own irritation taking over, because _hey_ , he’s spent time with plenty of women in the last couple of years, when he realizes. “Oh. I left the seat up, didn’t I?”

When she was younger and they shared a bathroom, Octavia had terrorized him until he’d stopped pretty much altogether, but it’s been two years since she got married and moved out.

He may have gotten lazy.

“You left the seat up,” Clarke confirms. “And my balance is seriously off with this whole situation, so you’re lucky I didn’t actually fall in.”

Bellamy winces when she pats her stomach. “Yeah, okay. That I am sorry for.”

“It was very clean, though,” Clarke muses. “If I _had_ to fall into a toilet, there are far worse ones out there.”

She cracks a smile, and Bellamy's torn between feeling embarrassed and sorry that he left the seat up and feeling grateful because nearly falling in at least has Clarke talking to him somewhat normally again.

Well. As normal as conversations about falling into toilets get.

He'll take it.

“What are you making?” she asks. She’s eyeing the spread on the counter.

He talks her through the spread, the different cheeses and meats and vegetables and fruits.

“We’re having grilled cheese.” Her voice is disbelieving.

“ _Fancy_ grilled cheese,” Bellamy corrects. “With whatever proteins or add-ons you want. Brie and pear is good.”

She’s smiling, but she looks kind of resigned, as if she doesn’t really want him to notice that she’s smiling.

“What?” he asks.

“You’re good at this,” she says.

“Um. Okay. At what?”

“This.” She gestures at the food, the slices of apple and pear, the veggies he’s laid out to look as appealing as possible. “At being a dad. You’re going to be a really good dad.”

“Because I can use a knife?”

“No. Because you care.”

Bellamy looks down at the countertop. “What do you want on your sandwich?” he asks, gruff.

* * *

He grills their fancy sandwiches, then heaps a pile of the leftover fruit slices on the side and fills a glass of ginger ale.

“What, no cloth napkins?” she teases when he sets her plate down in front of her. “Since we’re so fancy.”

“Shut up and eat your dinner.”

“Seriously, you’re already a pro at the disappointed-parent voice,” Clarke comments, then takes a bite of her sandwich.

Bellamy shrugs. “I had to deal with Octavia as a teenager,” he reminds her. “And even before my mom died, she was always sick or exhausted, so I was in charge most of the time.”

“Was she a handful?”

“She had her moments. But we were close, so it was a lot better than it could have been, I think. More good moments than hard ones.”

“What was the hardest thing?” Clarke asks, then cringes. “Sorry, sorry. Ignore that.”

Bellamy shakes his head, finishing the first half of his own sandwich. “The hardest thing? Probably when she graduated, got a job offer, and told me she was getting married before the school year started. It all pretty much happened at once, and I was basically a mess.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. It wasn’t that I disliked Lincoln or anything, just.”

“You were going to miss her.”

He lets out a half-laugh. “Yeah. But we got through it, even though she was pissed at me half the time, and I was a dick pretty much all the time. I walked her down the aisle and moved in here, since it didn’t make sense to keep a two-bedroom without a roommate.”

“It’s nice,” Clarke says, and Bellamy snorts. “Really!” she says. “I think it’s cozy.”

She looks earnest, and basically adorable, but _cozy_ for Bellamy is one of those words, like _quaint_ or _rustic,_ that means someone’s trying to be polite about something that’s actually a shithole, and he doesn’t really feel like hearing Clarke talk about his shithole apartment anymore.

“How long have you lived in your house?” he asks instead.

“Um, I bought it when I moved up here,” she says. “Right after college. So, a few years.”

“You own it?” he blurts out.

“Yeah. Monroe grew up here, and Raven got a job offer, so we all moved up after graduation. It just made more sense to buy outright, and then I had some income from Monroe and Raven paying rent until I managed to get into illustrating.” Clarke’s busy nibbling along a slice of apple, carefully avoiding the peel, so she doesn’t see his face.

Which is good, because who the fuck is able to fucking buy a fucking _house_ right out of undergrad?

And it’s not sounding like she has a fucking mortgage and monthly payments.

With an incredible amount of self control, Bellamy keeps himself from demanding what the hell kind of family she’s from, and changes the subject.

* * *

Once the dishes are clean, the leftovers packed away, an extra sandwich tucked into a disposable container for Clarke to take home with her, the kind of easy truce they’d fallen into for most of the evening dissipates.

“Do you want dessert?” he ventures, and hopes to god it doesn’t sound like he’s using code or something. He really means dessert, not—not anything else. There’s ice cream in the freezer.

She just shakes her head. “No, thanks. I’m actually kind of tired…” Clarke trails off, and Bellamy believes her this time. Her eyes are tired, and they never quite lost all the puffiness from when she cried at the doctor’s office.

He doesn’t want her to go, but he’s not about to force her to stay, so he nods. “Okay. Grab your stuff; I’ll take you home.”

This time, when she pulls on her boots, she holds onto him for balance instead of the wall.

He counts it as a small victory.

When they get to her house, he can already tell she’s about to tell him she’s fine, he doesn’t need to get out, so he jumps out of the car and opens her door for her before she can say anything.

Her expression is wry when she takes his hand, letting him help her up and out of the seat.

“Thank you,” she says, and he nods. He grabs the plastic grocery bag he’d put her leftovers into, gestures at her front door.

“I’ll walk you up.”

“You don’t have to,” Clarke begins.

“I’ll walk you up,” he repeats, and she sighs.

“Any weekend plans?” he asks, and she shakes her head.

“Just painting, probably. Though I wouldn’t be surprised if I get dragged out to go shopping, once I tell Raven and Monroe…” Her hand strokes over her belly, and the little smile on her face almost stops him from saying what he does next.

But not quite.

“I know I said I wasn’t going to talk about it for the rest of the night,” Bellamy begins haltingly, and when he sees her stiffen, he hurries on. “And I’m not. But…I just want to try one thing, before I go.”

Clarke eyes him. “What?”

“Just—” he takes her purse out of her hand, sets it with the leftovers on her welcome mat. Clarke’s lips part a little in confusion, then her eyes round when he takes her face in his hands, fingertips brushing her cheekbones. “Just this.”

“Bellamy—” Clarke says, and falls silent when he brushes a thumb over her lips.

“Please, Clarke? Just let me try it.”

He can feel it when she swallows nervously.

And then she gives him a minuscule nod.

This isn’t going to be a frenzied kiss, all heat and want with heads clouded by alcohol. Nor is it going to be a joyful one, a helpless expression of the impossible emotions seeing their daughter on a grainy screen brings about.

This kiss is deliberate, purposeful, full of intent.

He moves in slow, keeping his eyes on hers, watching as her eyelids lower the closer he gets until she looks almost dazed, waiting for his mouth to touch hers. When he finally fits his lips to hers, her eyes close completely, a tiny sigh slipping out her throat, brushing against his mouth.

Bellamy holds her still as he moves his lips against hers, sucks gently on her lower lip until she sighs again and opens her mouth, and he tilts his head to kiss her deeper, harder, until her hands come up to tangle in his hair and her body arches forward to press against him.

The door behind Clarke opens abruptly, Raven already complaining loudly. “Why the hell haven’t you answered my texts, Griffin? Or Monroe’s? I need to know wh—oh.”

Bellamy pulls back, and Clarke’s hands slip from his hair to his shoulders before she pulls them away completely, clasping them in front of her chest as she blushes a pale pink.

“Oh,” Raven repeats again. “ _Oh._ ” Bellamy feels the quick heat in his own face at her sly tone.

“Shut up,” Clarke says. “I’ll be inside in a minute.”

“No, that’s okay,” Bellamy says quickly. “I’m leaving. Just, uh. Think about it, Clarke?”

His heart feels like it’s being squeezed until she gives him another one of her tiny nods, and then he can breathe again.

“Thanks.” Mindful of Raven watching with far too much interest, he bends down and picks up Clarke’s things so she doesn’t have to. Then he hands them to her, and drops a kiss on Clarke’s cheek, grazing the corner of her mouth as he pulls back.

“Bye,” he says, and waves to Raven before he jogs away.

He can feel their eyes on him the whole way back to his car.

* * *

His sister has some sort of freaky sixth sense about things, because his phone starts to ring just half a block away from Clarke’s house. Bellamy tries to calm his heart because it’s been beating frantically ever since he walked Clarke to her door, and answers the phone.

“Hey,” he says, and his sister’s voice crackles over the cheap bluetooth speaker he’d installed in his car. The model was too old to have been manufactured with one, so he’d needed to add it in.

“Don’t _hey_ me, asshole,” Octavia says, impatience in her voice. “How’d it go?”

Bellamy has a moment of panic before he realizes Octavia’s asking about the results of the ultrasound, not of the day in general.

She doesn’t have a clue how truly skilled he is at fucking things up with Clarke.

Though, maybe, he hasn’t fucked them up completely, he thinks, remembering the way she’d watched him leave, looking kissed and dazed and flushed on the porch.

“Um. Good,” Bellamy says. It’s not a lie; a grin is spreading across his face as he waits for the light to change at the intersection. “Really good.”

“ _Bell_.”

“It’s a girl,” he says, and Octavia’s quiet for a long, long moment.

“O?” he says when the light changes and she still hasn’t spoken.

It’s hard to tell, given the shitty speaker, but he thinks he hears the tiniest little sniffle.

“Are you crying?”

“No!” she insists, and then Lincoln’s voice is coming over the phone.

“She had to go in the other room,” his brother-in-law says, voice fond. “She’s crying.”

“Is it…the good kind?” he asks uncertainly, and Lincoln laughs.

“Yeah, I’m pretty sure.” There’s some shuffling noises, then Lincoln adds, “Oh god, she’s already on Target.com. She’s just crying and clicking on baby clothes.”

“Oh my god.” In the background, he can hear Octavia tell Lincoln to go away, she’s busy.

“I’ll call you later!” she yells louder, so Bellamy can hear, and her voice is thick with tears.

“Are you sure she’s okay?” Bellamy asks.

“Yeah, she’s fine. What about you?” Lincoln asks. “This is big.”

“It was already big,” Bellamy replies, and turns onto his street. “Now it’s just…specific. Makes it more real.”

“Congratulations, Bellamy,” Lincoln says, and Bellamy smiles.

“Thanks,” he says. “Congratulations to you, too. You’re going to have a niece.”

“I look forward to it,” Lincoln says, and Bellamy can tell he means it. “Listen, I think I should go before Octavia buys the entire online baby department. We’ll see you soon?”

“Yeah,” Bellamy says, and they hang up.

* * *

He lets himself into the apartment, drops his keys on the counter along with his wallet. He groans; he has to work straight through the weekend, starting tomorrow morning, in order to make up for taking a whole Friday off. Fridays are big for bar business.

Fuck, he really needs to start applying for other jobs. He can’t be working whole weekends at the bar whenever he’s got the kid.

He wanders back to his bathroom, imagining it, what it might be like after she’s born, while he brushes his teeth.

Loud, he remembers that much from when Octavia was a baby. Except when they had to be very, very quiet because she was finally asleep.

The kitchen didn’t smell like real food for nearly a year, instead just like the overly strong strained peas and mashed turkey of the baby food. Bellamy can’t imagine something smelling like that actually tasting good, and wonders what Clarke’s thoughts are on homemade baby food.

Octavia’d slept in his mother’s room until she was sleeping through the night; once she’d needed her own bedroom, Bellamy had slept on the pull-out couch so she could have the tiny second bedroom. He’d like something better for his daughter than a room barely bigger than a closet, decorated with a six-year-old boy’s forgotten toys and thrift-store posters. Maybe he’ll paint the nursery. He doesn’t think he’d go for pink, and besides, that whole color-coordinating infants based on gender norms isn’t his favorite thing.

Then, as he’s settling into bed with a book so he can try to go sleep early, he realizes. A closet’s about the only place he’s got.

Shit. Where the hell is he going to put her?

 _Shit_. His room isn’t too tiny, so he guesses there’s room for a crib. But what about when she gets bigger?

“Fuck,” Bellamy says, glaring at his bedroom door.

Forget kid-proofing the place.

He has to move.

* * *

He manages to drop off to sleep in the next few hours, thoughts of job applications and moving boxes and rental deposits and paint colors swirling through his mind, but he doesn’t sleep well. He’s woken up early the next morning by a text making his phone buzz, and he can’t even bring himself to be mad about it; it’s more of a relief to just give up on sleeping.

The text from Miller is blurry, and Bellamy rubs the sleep from his eyes with a groan.

_so. monty says he saw you guys yesterday at work._

Before he can respond, another text comes in.

_how are things._

Bellamy stares at the texts, puzzled.

 _good? clarke’s good, kid is good,_ he responds.

 _good,_ Miller replies.

That’s it for a few minutes, long enough for Bellamy to get up and get the water started in the shower.

Then his phone buzzes again, just as he’s about to climb in.

_ok you know what? fuck you blake_

Another angry buzz. _just fucking tell me. we want to know asshole._

And another. _fuck you go get a new best friend if you’re gonna be a dick._

Bellamy laughs, the sound echoing in the small bathroom.

_aww, calm down uncle nathan._

Two texts come through in rapid succession.

_fuck._

_you._

Bellamy grins, types a response, then gets in the shower.

_it’s a girl._

When he gets out ten minutes later, hair dripping, Miller’s reply is waiting, and Bellamy grins again.

_fuck yeah._

Bellamy really wants Clarke to agree to at least _try_ to do this together; he thinks they have a shot, and fuck, he really likes her when she’s not driving him up the fucking wall. She's beautiful, and talented, and whenever he manages to learn something about her, it just makes him want to learn more. 

But even if she says no, he knows he can do this; he can work with Clarke. They’ll be good parents, and he’ll have support—he has Octavia, and Lincoln, and his best friend, even if Miller likes to hide his interest in everything with profane language and/or silence. 

He can do this with their help, and with Clarke as just a partner.

But damn, does he really want to do it  _together_.

He just hopes she decides she wants to, too. 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter didn't cover a lot of time chronologically, but I hope you still enjoyed! I'm feeling really excited about Clarke's POV in the next chapter, so here's to hoping Chapter 11 comes out sooner than normal!


	11. Chapter 11

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Clarke processes. And shops.

“What was _that_?” Raven demands the second Bellamy drives away. “Holy shit!”

“Nothing,” Clarke says shortly, pushing past her into the house. She trudges into the kitchen, dropping her bag on the counter with a sigh. The plastic bag housing the extra sandwich Bellamy had insisted she take rustles, and Clarke’s shoulders droop.

“Clarke?” Raven sounds concerned, and Clarke doesn’t look at her as she puts the food in the fridge. “Clarke, is everything okay?”

She doesn’t say anything, just tries to breathe through the irritation and the sadness and the fear.

“ _Clarke_. Was it your doctor’s appointment?”

“Why is he like this?” Clarke says finally, frustrated.

“Fuck, Clarke!”

Clarke looks up at the anger in her best friend’s voice, and finds herself with an armful of Raven. Raven’s hugging her fiercely, and when she pulls back she shakes Clarke by the shoulders. “What the hell is wrong with you? I thought something was really wrong for a second.”

“I’m sorry,” Clarke says, miserable. “No, the baby’s okay.” She gives Raven a tired smile. “She’s okay.”

Raven stares at her for a split second, then whoops. “I won!”

“Raven!”

“Don’t worry, I’ll spend my winnings on the kid.”

Clarke snorts softly, and Raven softens. “Hey. If it’s not the baby, what’s wrong?”

“Bellamy,” Clarke admits, and goes into the living room. She stares at the movies as she wrenches her boots off. She’s not feeling quite like she’s on a _Pride and Prejudice_ level of anxiety, but she’s definitely not up for anything bright and animated. She curses the fact that her tastes run toward fun kid movies and romances, and grabs _Warm Bodies_ off the shelf.

“He didn’t look like he was doing anything wrong when I opened the door,” Raven prods when Clarke’s started the movie and curled into the couch. “More like he was doing something very, very right.”

Clarke shoves her face into a throw pillow. “I know,” she says, muffled. “I hate him.”

“Really? Then I might take him,” Raven muses, and Clarke kicks out blindly at her before heaving a sigh.

“No, not really. And you have Kyle,” Clarke says. “Back off.”

“Oh, it’s a _back off_ situation now?”

Clarke notices she doesn’t deny she has Kyle, files that away. “He said he wants to be together. With me,” she adds unnecessarily.

When Raven doesn’t immediately respond, Clarke lifts her face from the pillow, sees the supremely unsurprised look on the other woman’s face.

“What?” she says when she sees Clarke looking. “Do you _want_ me to say I told you so? Because I will. I told you so.”

“You said he’d be into someone eventually! Not that he’d be into _me_!”

Raven lets out an incredulous laugh. “Yeah, I said that he’d be into someone eventually. _After_ I pointed out he was yours for the taking, you idiot. He’s so fucking into you, Clarke. And don’t you _dare_ tell me you’re not just as into him.”

Clarke is silent.

“That’s what I thought.” Raven pokes Clarke’s foot until Clarke looks at her. “So, you like him. He likes you. From what I could see, he’s apparently still a pro at getting you hot and bothered. He looks at you like you’re the goddamn sun. What’s the problem, exactly?”

“What’s the—are you serious?” Clarke demands, sitting up. “The problem is that this wouldn’t be a normal relationship, Raven, come on. It’s not like we’d break up and never have to see each other again.”

Raven shrugs. “So don’t break up.”

Clarke goggles at her. “What?”

“You’re not going to be able to have a parenting break-up,” Raven points out. “If you get angry and fight about something to do with the kid, it’s not like you’re going to be able to avoid him forever.”

“You’re making zero sense, you realize that, right?”

Raven waves her hand. “What I’m saying is you guys aren’t going to always agree on kid stuff, right?”

“Right,” Clarke says slowly.

“But you’re going to have to learn how to talk and compromise and all that shit, because he’s not leaving, and obviously you’re not. And unless you want to make that kid miserable, you’re going to have to learn to talk and compromise while being nice to each other. Not the fake stuff; kids can tell when it’s fake, and that’ll just fuck her up worse than hating each other outright.”

“I’m not—I don’t—what?” Clarke asks helplessly.

“You’re going to be bomb parents, okay? And you’re mostly not an idiot, so just take all that parenting communication stuff—” Raven mimes picking something up, moving it to her other side, then dropping it. “And use it for your dumb relationship stuff.”

She stares. “I…really don’t think it works like that.”

Raven shrugs, pats Clarke’s feet. “Well, I think it does. Or at least, it’ll help. Think about it anyway.” She stands. “I’m going to text everyone, let them know I win at life, the universe, and everything. Just stew in your angst until you figure out I’m right and you should jump that guy while you can.”

“I hate you!” Clarke calls after her.

“Same!” Raven replies cheerfully, and then Clarke hears the soft click of her bedroom door closing.

She really wants to watch the stupid movie and not _think_ right now, not about herself or about Bellamy or about the baby, but Clarke’s phone starts lighting up nonstop after that, all variations on exclamations of _It’s a girl!!!!1!!11!_ She sends replies back, as cheerful-sounding as she can stand, because even though she feels far from cheerful her friends will only get worse if she doesn’t reply.

One of the last texts that comes in is a short one from _Mrs. Woods_. Clarke sighs, changes the contact to _Octavia Woods_. It feels like spite at this point, keeping it as _Mrs._ And the text reads _Can’t wait to meet my niece!! Congrats Clarke_ with a bunch of happy little emojis tacked onto the end.

She stares at it, wondering how to reply, wondering if Bellamy had told Octavia anything else about their afternoon.

Eventually she just texts _Thanks,_ adds the first vaguely positive emoji she sees, then rolls over and hides her face in the cushions again.

* * *

It can’t be as simple as Raven said, Clarke thinks later that night once  _Warm Bodies_ finishes and she’s curled up in bed. She’s exhausted, but her mind is too busy to sleep. For a few minutes, she tries to distract herself by texting Murphy the weirdest emoticons she can find while complaining about her too-happy movie collection; he sends her a picture of Nicholas Cage.

She’s not sure if that’s a threat or a promise to bring her the _National Treasure_ movies, but it makes her laugh, so she sends him more emojis that she knows he hates.

Then she sets her phone on her nightstand, wiggles out of her pajama shorts until she’s in the stretchy cami and underwear that serve as her pajamas. Even though it’s still pretty cool, she can’t bear to sleep in anything warmer, though even her stretchiest of stretchy tops is getting pulled to its limit. Just another thing she needs to buy in a bigger size.

But she still can’t fall asleep, not yet.

 _So don’t break up_ , Raven had said, as if that were a reasonable response.

Sure, Clarke thinks wildly, just commit to being with a guy she’s known for a few weeks, or a few months, depending on how she’s counting.

Raven means well, but she doesn’t get it.

Bellamy had said that he’d want to date her even without the baby. It sounds nice, Clarke admits, except that’s not reality. The reality is there _is_ a baby, and they’re going to be parents, and there’s no pretending that they’re not.

Is it really worth risking it? Trying to be together only to figure out that they can’t be?

Or to find out that just _one_ of them doesn’t want to be?

Clarke groans and pulls the blankets over her head.

* * *

“Yeah, but is it worth risking it to  _never_ try?” Monroe says the next day. True to her prediction to Bellamy, Clarke’s been dragged away from her work to the mall, though she’d told her friends that if they were going shopping, she probably needed new clothes sooner than the baby did. Now she’s in the middle of Motherhood Maternity, glaring at the smooth cream-colored mannequins with their perfect baby bumps and unblemished skin.

“What?”

“You’re worried that you’ll try being together and you fail,” Monroe reasons, tossing a purple sundress at Clarke. She catches it, pulls at the skirt. It’s like a circus tent. “But it doesn’t sound like _not_ trying is working well for you, either. And there’s the whole what-if thing. You’ll wonder _what if we’d tried_ for the rest of your life or something dumb like that, or at least until you’re having a mid-life crisis and decide to hit on him one night after too many margaritas, and then his wife will punch you in the nose.”

“What is wrong with you?” Raven asks, admiring.

Monroe brushes imaginary lint off her shoulders. “I have a gift.”

Her stomach had curdled when Monroe had spoken about Bellamy’s imaginary future wife, and Clarke realizes with a sinking feeling that she is way, way beyond being able to risk not trying.

“Shit,” she says, and a heavily pregnant woman pushing a double stroller gives her a dirty look. “Crap, sorry.” She slaps a hand over her mouth, and gives the woman an apologetic look.

“No, keep going,” Raven says. “I want to hear how many accidental profanities you drop in the preggo store.”

“Screw you,” Clarke whispers.

“She heard that,” Monroe tells her brightly, and Clarke huffs.

“I have the worst friends,” she announces, and Raven dumps a massive armful of clothing on her.

“Stop complaining and try this stuff on.”

Her friends aren’t _that_ bad, she concedes when she finds enough clothing to tide her over for the next couple of months. A single pair of jeans with an embarrassingly stretchy waistband for when she can’t get out of wearing pants, some actual maternity leggings, a couple t-shirts with that weird side ruching that makes people look pregnant even when they’re not. A bunch of dresses that have a ridiculous amount of material gathered in the front, so the skirts can drape over a belly of any size.

One of them is a little nicer than the others, a slippery material rather than the cool cotton she’d gotten the others in. It makes her feel pretty, and—it’s not that she feels _hideous_ or anything, and objectively she knows she hasn’t turned into a troll since she got pregnant. But it’s still been hard, watching her body change, even as she’s grateful that she’s able to see the proof of her daughter growing. There’s just that lingering bit of self-consciousness now that her belly’s the first thing that enters the room.

But in this dress, she feels _pretty_ , and she finds herself wondering what Bellamy would think of her in it.

“Yeah, yeah, you’re hot, hurry it up,” Raven says; Clarke jerks and looks away from her reflection in the store’s mirror. “Buy all that crap and let’s go. I’m _starving_.”

The second Raven says that, Clarke realizes she is too. When she checks her phone as she changes back into her own clothes, it turns out to well past lunchtime.

“Burgers,” Monroe says dreamily while Clarke pays. “Bottomless fries. One of those lemonade vodka drinks.”

“It’s two in the afternoon,” Clarke says. Monroe grabs some of the bags, Raven even more until all Clarke has is one measly bag and her purse.

“Really? Awesome. Then we’ll have plenty of time for more shopping afterward,” Monroe declares.

Raven snorts, and Clarke sighs.

* * *

After lunch, during which Clarke enjoys her own burger, two refills of her own bottomless fries, and a vodka-free freckled lemonade, she drives her slightly-inebriated friends to the Target near her house. She picks up a few more things in their maternity department, and then her friends drag her to the baby section.

Clarke hasn’t bought—anything. For the baby, for a nursery. Until today, for her changing body. She hadn’t really let herself even _look_ in the direction of the baby department.

It’s not that it’s not real to her, that she’s having a baby. She is, she knows she is, and she loves her daughter as much as you can love anybody you’ve only ever met because your body is growing them.

Which is a lot. A whole lot.

But she just—she just needed to wait, for a while.

Plus, she knew that once she started, it'd be pretty much impossible to stop.

“What is up with these?” Raven says, disgust in her voice, as she tosses aside tiny little clothes patterned with cupcakes and butterflies and fruit.

“They’re cute!” Monroe argues as Raven starts burrowing into the piles on the side of the display labeled “boys.”

“Why are they all separated like this?” Raven demands. “Just mix ‘em all in. Let the parents decide what the hell they want to buy their kids, not the stupid labels.”  

“They’re working on it,” Monroe comments. “Didn’t you see all the hype on the internet about the toy sections?”

Clarke’s not paying attention. There’s a tiny little onesie on the table in front of her, so small that she can hardly believe it would fit any baby. But the tag says it’s supposed to, and it’s the prettiest pale green, little red ladybugs printed all over. She reaches out, fingertips hesitating over the material. It looks soft.

“Oh,” she says, a little helpless. It’s soft, so soft, and sweet and pretty and _perfect_ and oh god, she’s going to cry. Why does she have to cry all the damn time? She’s an ugly crier, and she hates it and she just _doesn’t do it_ , until now, because her hormones are the worst.

She hears Monroe sigh dramatically before arms go around her, holding gently.

“She’s having a meltdown,” she calls to Raven, and Clarke hears the clatter of plastic hangers being dropped into the cart before she’s being squeezed twice as tight.

“Stop,” Raven commands, but her chin rests on Clarke’s shoulder, and she doesn’t make to move away. Monroe is petting her hair, kind of like someone would pet a cat when they’re unsure of the cat’s true intentions, but it’s still sweet, and Clarke lets out a watery laugh.

“I’m fine,” she assures them. She sniffles. “I’m good. I swear.”

“Are you buying that?” Monroe asks. “Because if you’re not, I am.”

“Dibs,” Clarke says firmly, and her friends let her go.

* * *

She’s trying to tell herself she doesn’t need to check out the baby blankets—what if she gets some weird pregnancy urge to knit or something? She doesn't know how to knit, but she could learn, probably. She doesn’t want to end up knee-deep in baby blankets—but she fails, and turns down the aisle. A familiar head of dark hair is in front of the racks of baby things, crouching in front of the crib bedding sets as she watches.

“Octavia?”

The other woman starts, and topples backward to land on her ass.

“I’m sorry,” Clarke says, hurrying forward. “Are you alright?”

She holds out her hands automatically, but Octavia takes them without hesitation as she pulls herself back to her feet.

“I’m fine,” she says. “Just—” She breaks off, looking a little embarrassed. “I promised Lincoln I wouldn’t do anymore baby shopping for at least two weeks.” At Clarke’s blank expression, she sighs and adds, “I might have hit Target.com a little too hard last night after Bell called.”

“Oh.”

Octavia grins, the dusting of pink over her cheeks fading. “It’s a girl?”

Clarke cups her belly. “Yeah.”

Before Clarke can realize what’s happening, she’s wrapped in a fierce hug. “Oh my god. It’s a girl.”

“It’s the day for hugs, apparently,” Clarke manages, and pats Octavia on the back. Octavia rocks from side to side, and she sounds dangerously sniffly when she finally lets Clarke go.

“Sorry,” Octavia says, waving a hand. “I’m excited. This is exciting. It’s exciting, isn’t it?”

“It is,” Clarke agrees, but she can’t help but ask, “You’re still okay with it?”

Octavia blinks at her. “Why wouldn’t I be okay?”

She raises an eyebrow. “Well, you did kind of hunt me down and interrogate me about my finances and my intentions toward your brother a couple weeks ago.”

Octavia waves a hand. “And you make your own money, and you said you weren’t going to hurt him. So we’re good,” Octavia continues. “And I’m going to bankrupt myself and my husband buying baby things. My niece is going to be a fashion warrior.”

“Um,” Clarke says. It’s strange, and nice, for someone other than her friends and Bellamy to be this excited, invested, in the baby. And she’s—Octavia’s going to be her baby’s family. Not that Raven and Monroe aren’t, but.

Her baby is going to have more family than Clarke ever did.

“Don’t worry, I’ll save some of it for your baby shower. When is it?” Octavia asks, taking Clarke’s arm and walking back toward the baby clothes section. “I don’t want to double book myself. I’m _not_ going to miss it for some dumb school thing, but I also don’t want to get fired.”

“I don’t—” Clarke tries, and Octavia spots Raven and Monroe.

“Ladies! Thoughts about Clarke’s baby shower?”

* * *

It’s probably rude to call him, Clarke reasons. It’s late, nearly midnight, but she can’t fall asleep. That's getting to be a habit, the not-sleeping, which sucks. She’d tried to lull herself to sleep to the sound of explosions from one of the Marvel movies Murphy had sent along with Monroe for her, but it didn’t work, and now she’s just nursing a headache from all the booming.

She just— _god_ , she just doesn’t want to ruin everything. For herself, for Bellamy, but mostly for her daughter, she thinks miserably, smoothing a hand over her belly.

Octavia was _so_ excited in the store, and Clarke’s parents were only children, so she never had aunts or uncles to be excited about her. She _wants_ that for the baby, wants her to have more than just Clarke.

She’d do a damn fine job of it on her own, and her friends would be like aunts and uncles, but—she’s not doing on her own, and it’s scary and awful and amazing because Clarke does not want to screw this up.

So she really shouldn’t do anything that could screw it up. Like dating Bellamy. That could really screw it up.

But.

It could really screw it up if she didn’t try things with him, because god, she’d wanted to throw up when Monroe had gone on about Bellamy’s future non-Clarke-wife.

So maybe, just maybe…it could also be really great.

Dating him.

Her fingers find her phone and she hits his name in her contact before she can stop herself.

“Shit,” she says, staring wide-eyed at the screen. This was a terrible plan of action. This was the equivalent of invading Russia in the middle of winter. She should just retreat before she dies of emotional hypothermia.

But it would be weird to just hang up now, right? Because he would see the missed call and wonder what her problem is, and—

“Hello?” His voice is raspy, heavy with sleep. “Clarke, are you okay? The baby?”

“I’m fine,” Clarke says, mortified. “Sorry. I can call back in the morning.”

“No, uh. No, it’s okay.” There’s rustling as she imagines him sitting up in bed, hair all rumpled.

God, she’d really like to see his hair all rumpled.

“Clarke?”

“I want to try,” she blurts out, then holds her breath. "Us. I want to try us."

There’s a moment of silence, and all she can hear are the quiet inhalations and exhalations as he breathes on the other end of the line.

“Really?” he asks finally. “You’re really going to give us a shot?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

She stutters for a minute. “What? Why? What the hell, since when do I have to apply to say yes with a verbal essay?”

“You don’t _have_ to,” Bellamy says, voice a little clearer now. “I just…I really like you, Clarke. And I wanted you to say yes, obviously. But I also didn’t want you to say yes because you thought I’d hate you or something if you said no.”

“Well.” She clears her throat. “It’s definitely not because of that.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah,” she says softly. “I really like you, too. But Bellamy?”

“Hmm?”

“I’m kind of freaking out,” she admits. “I don’t want to ruin anything.”

“I don’t want to ruin anything either,” he says. “So we won’t.”

Clarke lets out a half-laugh. “Raven said something similar. I think it’s bullshit. How can we just decide this is going to work?”

“We can decide we’re going to do our best to make it work,” he says reasonably. “And I think that if we both try, well, we might not end up living happily ever after in love, but we won’t have ruined anything, either.”

“Promise?” She doesn’t mean to say it, hasn’t asked anyone to promise her anything since her father and Wells both died. People have offered them, but she hasn’t asked for one in years. But it feels like there’s something fragile in her chest, something delicate that she can’t handle on her own. And she needs him.

“I promise,” he says, gentle. “It’s late, Clarke. We can talk more tomorrow.”

“Okay,” she says, suddenly feeling the burn of keeping her eyelids open. “Okay. Night, Bellamy.”

“Sweet dreams, princess.”

And finally, she sleeps.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alas, only a phone call as far as Bellarke interaction, but honestly, Clarke is a hot mess of emotions and she needed to process and/or be yelled at for her stupidity by her friends. I hope you enjoyed, and I'd love to hear your thoughts!


	12. Chapter 12

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bellamy and Clarke hang out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The only excuse I can offer for this taking so long is that I have lots of excuses. But instead of giving you those, I'd rather just give you my thanks. Thanks for sticking around and reading this story, and for giving me such wonderful encouragement in your comments and kudos. It's all of you who make it worthwhile, and I appreciate each and every one of you. Just, thanks. <3

Bellamy wakes up early.

He doesn’t have work until later, but he’d planned even before Clarke’s midnight phone call to get an early start looking for jobs.

And now, you know, Clarke wants to date him. Sleeping is for the weak, like loser guys who aren’t dating the hot, smart, talented mothers of their future child.

He’ll probably panic later, spend way too long googling stupid shit like flower language until he’s late for work, wondering if he should send her flowers or candy or something. Is there an appropriate gesture for when the woman you impregnated somewhat grudgingly agrees to go out with you?

Well. He might be panicking a little now. But, like, in joy.

Bellamy pulls out his phone and texts Octavia.

_should i send clarke flowers_

Almost instantly, he regrets it, because shouldn't he, as an adult, figure these kinds of things out without asking his baby sister? Then the little dots pop up to indicate Octavia’s typing.

 _why are you already awake?????_ he texts. It’s Sunday, and the Octavia he knows takes every opportunity to sleep in when it’s not a school day.

 _that’s none of ur business,_ she replies instantly, then adds, _why would u send clarke flowers?_

_r u apologizing for something?_

_did u get her double pregnant_

_DID SHE FIND OUT WHAT A FUCKING NERD U R???_

_AND NOW SHE KNOWS SHE’S DOOMED TO BE A MOM TO A BB NERD??_

Bellamy sighs.

* * *

He convinces himself that he should be checking Craigslist for job listings instead of places that deliver hot apple cider to houses (“That is not a _thing_ , Blake, get it together”), and settles for sending Clarke a brief good morning text.

Then he adds a smiley face, because. Well, just because, shut up.

Bellamy pours himself some cereal and sets up his laptop at the kitchen table, spooning his breakfast into his mouth and typing slowly with his left hand.

Only half an hour later, the remaining mini wheats are sad, sodden rafts floating in room temperature milk. He feels like he’s already going cross-eyed sifting through the vaguely-worded listings in his area, and if Octavia saw him glaring at the screen she’d probably nag him about going to the optometrist again.

He just doesn’t know what to _do_. Most of his experience is bartending, some waiting tables, and the whole point is to get out of that. He could try and transition to a restaurant, Bellamy guesses, but that seems like a poor use of his degrees without any guarantee of more kid-friendly hours.

There are lots of community colleges in the surrounding area, so he could try to teach, but he got his master’s degree online—it wasn’t like he got any teaching experience as a T.A. or anything, so that’s iffy. And he can’t teach kids without a California teaching credential, which involves a lot more time, effort, and money than he has to spare right now. He’s kind of on a deadline to find a new, better job and new, better apartment, what with the baby coming in—fuck, coming in barely more than four months or so.

Which is too bad, he thinks. Not the baby coming soon, but that there’s no time to seriously consider the public school teacher option. He thinks he’d like working with kids, like his sister does, and he could terrorize her all the time, like the good old days, if he got a job at her school.

But that won’t work, not now. Maybe one day, he thinks, but not today.

He opens a new tab, and keeps searching.

* * *

Eventually he drags himself into the shower and eats another bowl of cereal for an early lunch, then goes to work. He beats Miller there by just a few minutes, and is unpacking the newest shipment of booze and food supplies when he pokes his head in the back.

“Hey.”

“Hey.”

“You need help?”

“Sure.”

They unpack in silence for a bit, only grunting a little as they pass the heavier boxes to one another.

“How’s Clarke?” Miller asks, casual.

“Fine, as far as I know. I haven’t talked to her yet today.”

“Cool. Uh.”

Bellamy glances over at his friend, and sees the dark flush creeping up his neck.

“What?”

“Nothing,” Miller bites out. “Just—my dad says congratulations. I called him last night. Just because.”

Bellamy grins at the box of Malibu. “Well, the next time you call your dad _just because_ , you can also tell him that Clarke and I are together.”

“What? What the fuck,” Miller demands, and cuffs the side of his head. “You could have fucking said that when I asked how Clarke was. Jesus christ, you’re a disaster, Blake.”

Laughing, Bellamy fends him off. Eventually they finish unpacking, and settle into their routine, Miller sulking slightly.  They mix drinks for all of the people who like to drink questionably early in the day on a Sunday, and deliver greasy baskets of fries, wings, and burgers to people who drank questionably late into Saturday night and need the hangover food. Bellamy texts Clarke a few times, and sends her a picture of the doodle someone left on their bill of a unicorn riding a skateboard.

She replies with her own doodle of a pegasus surfing, and the dumb grin is on his face for the next hour.

It’s heading toward closing, and things are pretty slow, which is good; Miller takes over the bar and Bellamy gets a chance to go over the schedule for the next couple of weeks, switching a couple shifts around before sending it off. The owner of the bar isn’t especially interested in the day-to-day functions or in the employees, so Bellamy does most of it. He doesn’t mind; the pay, for a bar job, is decent, and now that he’s done with his degree he’s been able to save a little more every month instead of spending his paycheck on tuition.

Miller taps him on the shoulder when he’s trying to decide when to schedule inventory in the next month; Bellamy looks up, eyes taking a second to focus on him after staring at the bar’s laptop for so long.  

“You’ve got a visitor,” Miller says, motioning over toward the door. Bellamy follows his gaze and sees Clarke standing near the entrance, searching the bar area with her eyes. He’s in a booth, tucked into the corner so he could spread out with the laptop and paperwork, so it takes a while for her to find him when she doesn’t immediately see him at the bar.

When she sees him, a shy smile spreads across her face, and his heart does something vaguely painful, but in a good way.

“Hey,” he says when she arrives at his table, saying hello to Miller and then slipping in the booth across from him. “What are you doing here?”

Miller moves away, back to the bar, and Clarke shrugs a little. There’s a touch of pink in her cheeks, and he’s pretty sure she’s the most adorable thing he’s ever seen. “You said we’d talk today. I don’t think texting or unicorn skater really counts, though.”

“Sorry,” he says immediately, chastened. “I had to work, but I should have called on my break or something.”

“Of course you had to work,” Clarke says. “Don’t apologize. Plus, I wanted to see you in person, so this works better than over the phone.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

He rubs the back of his neck. “Okay. Well, good. I’m glad to see you.”

She smiles again, bright. “I’m glad to see you, too. You look busy,” she adds, looking at the messy tabletop.

Miller shows up again and snorts as he sets a glass of sprite with a lemon twist and a mint sprig in front of Clarke. “Of course he _looks_ busy,” he says as she beams and thanks him. “That’s how he gets out of working the bar with me like he’s supposed to.”

“Hey! I’m also supposed to set the schedules and do the ordering and schedule inventory and process timecards,” he retorts. “Go make a fancy drink and leave us alone.”

“I’m calling it,” Miller warns, and Bellamy waves him off. They don’t stay open very late Sunday nights, only until nine, and it’s half-till. There are only a handful of patrons left anyway, and the sooner last call is through, the sooner they can clean up and leave.

“So,” he says, and reaches across the table to take her hand. It’s small, and soft, and a little chilly from holding her drink. She stares at her hand in his, then looks up. “How was your day?”

“It was...nice,” she says. “I slept in, and then I painted.” She smells a little like paint, he realizes. He’d never been especially attracted to art supplies, but he guesses there’s a first time for everything.

“For a book?”

“No,” she says, sounding satisfied. “Just for me.”

He smiles. “Is that unusual?”

Clarke thinks about it for a moment. “Not really. I mean, even when I’m illustrating a book, it usually feels like I’m painting for me. I almost always love it. But it’s the first time in awhile that I had an idea that wasn’t for a book job, and I had the time and energy to paint it.”

Bellamy prods gently, coaxing words out of her until she’s gesturing enthusiastically with her free hand while she describes the painting that had occupied her most of the day. He keeps hold of the other, stroking the soft skin with his thumb until she’s used to it.

The painting sounds similar to a lot of her work he’s seen on google; more of the ethereal landscapes and whimsical creatures, but he gets it—when you love something, you don’t often get tired of it. You just think of new ways you want to work with it. And all of her art he’s seen is amazing, though he’s not really an art connoisseur or anything. It’s the kind that can appeal to someone without a background in art, which is nice.

He realizes he’s staring at her with a likely stupid-looking smile when she abruptly stops talking about mermaids and turns pink.

“I’m sorry,” she says. “This is lame.”

“What? Why? I love mermaids,” he says, and she laughs.

“Well, who doesn’t? But I probably shouldn’t interrupt you at work just to talk your ear off about them.”

Bellamy shrugs. “I was getting too far ahead in my work anyway. I wouldn’t know what to do with myself if I’d finished more.”

Clarke rolls her eyes at him, and he grins.

“What about you?” she asks. “What did you do today?”

“Other than work?”

Miller yells at him from the bar just then, and Bellamy sends him a hassled look. Miller’s gesturing at Cage, one of their Sunday regulars, who is busy propping up the wall like it’s his job.

Bellamy rolls his eyes and turns back to Clarke. “I’ve got to take care of this.” Miller says something unflattering, and his mouth quirks up. “And I should probably help Miller with closing.”

“Oh.” Clarke looks a little abashed, and Bellamy squeezes her hand one last time before pulling it away to pack up the paperwork.

“But if you want to talk more later, we can,” he offers. She usually heads to bed early, he knows, but he might as well offer.

She perks up. “Yeah?”

“Sure. My place or yours?”

She blinks, and he flushes. “I mean, not to—just for talking. Not for the reason that phrase usually implies. Shit.”

Clarke just smiles at him, amused and kind of fond. “Mine, maybe? Murphy just gave me the second _Captain America_ , and we could put it in while we hang out.”

“Well, how can I say no to the second _Captain America_?” Bellamy reasons, and slides out of the booth. He offers his hands to help pull her out of the deep cushions, which she accepts, wobbling only a little when he lifts her up a little too fast and she has to try to regain her balance.

“Sorry,” he says, and she gives him a dry look.

She tucks her hair behind her ear, and he spies a tiny streak of blue on her earlobe. He can imagine her, paintbrush in hand, color smeared up her arms, using the back of her hand to push her hair away from her face and leaving the blue behind.

“I’ll see you soon?”

He nods. “Yeah, I’ll try to hurry things up here. Shouldn’t take too long.”

“You don’t have to rush,” she says. “I don’t mind waiting.”

She stands there for a moment, adjusting that big plaid scarf of hers. It’s chilly out tonight, and she’s still wearing her peacoat, but the bottom buttons are undone, her belly straining against the fabric. Bellamy wants to wrap her up, keep her warm.

He wants to kiss her. He can kiss her, right? Like a goodbye kind of thing. They’re dating, albeit awkwardly so far, so he can kiss her. That’s allowed.

Bellamy puts his hand on her cheek, then slides his fingers through her hair to cup the back of her head. Clarke looks surprised for just a second, and then as he dips his mouth to meet hers, her eyes flutter closed.

It’s a brief kiss, sweet and short, and he tastes her chapstick when he pulls away and licks his lips.

“I’ll be there as soon as I can,” he says. Clarke nods, then stands on her tiptoes to plant her own goodbye-kiss on his cheek.

“Okay. I’ll see you later.”

“Drive safe.”

She tosses him one last smile over her shoulder, then slips out the door.

“Jesus christ,” Miller says, disgust thick in his voice.

“What?” Bellamy demands.

“You’re pathetic,” Miller says. “That’s all, nothing new.”

Bellamy flips him off, Miller claps him on the shoulder, and they get to work.

* * *

Her neighborhood is quiet when he gets there, cool and dark except for the lights burning in the occasional window. She left her porch light on for him, and answers his knock almost immediately.

She changed, and now she’s wearing one of those stretchy tank tops and pajama pants patterned with little owls. A thin sliver of skin shows between the hem of her top and where her pants ride low, below the swell of her stomach. Bellamy swallows.

“Come in,” Clarke says. “You’re letting all the cold air in.”

“Sorry,” he says, and she rolls her eyes and grabs him by the arm to pull him into the house.

“You hungry?” she asks.

“Nah.”

She squints at him. “Really? Or are you just doing that weird _we’re not close enough for me to admit I’m actually hungry when I’m at your house_ thing?”

He grins at her, feeling his face get warm. “Okay, yeah. I could eat.”

Clarke huffs a little, then heads toward the kitchen. Before he follows, he toes out of his shoes, leaving them next to the door. He hears her make a small exasperated sound, and looks up to see her watching him, frowning.

“You don’t have to do that here,” she says.

Bellamy shrugs. “I was just being polite,” he says, teasing a little.

She narrows her eyes. “Don’t be a dick.” But she smiles a little, and doesn’t _sound_ irritated, so he thinks she doesn’t really mind.

“Where’s Raven?” he asks in the kitchen. They’d settled into a somewhat awkward silence as she rummages through the fridge and cupboards, coming up with salami and crackers and cheese. She glances up from arranging it on a tray. He didn't  _really_ think people did that outside of movies and hotels and special occasions. 

“In her room,” Clarke replies. “She’s been working on a grant proposal, and it’s due this week. She’s trying to make up for the time we lost shopping yesterday.”

“Oh.” They lapse back into quiet, and it feels even more awkward than before, knowing that Raven’s barricaded herself in her room. The last roommate he’d lived with was Octavia, and he’s not used to having someone conspicuously remove themselves from common areas to give you privacy. His sister definitely never bothered.

Bellamy guesses that it could be true, that Raven needs the quiet of her own room to work. But it feels weird.

“Come on,” Clarke says, picking up the tray. She’s added two glasses of iced tea. “Decaf,” she adds when she sees him looking. “Obviously.”

“Good,” he says, and takes the tray from her hands. “Lead the way.”

The tv is already on the _Captain America: The Winter Soldier_ menu screen, softly playing sound effects and music. He wonders if she’d been nervous, waiting for him to show up, and had queued it up to keep herself busy. Or maybe he’s just an asshole and she just likes to be prepared, which is highly likely as well.  

Bellamy sets the tray down on the ottoman where Clarke points, then spends probably too long trying to figure out how close he should sit next to her on the couch. He settles about a foot and a half away, because any more than that just seems like he’s being weird, but he doesn’t really know where they stand on cuddling yet.

“This one’s my favorite,” he says when Clarke presses play.

“Of the two _Captain America_ movies? Or all of the Marvel movies?”

“All of them.”

She beams. “Me too!”

He watches, delighted, as she meticulously stacks the meat and cheese between two saltines, then eats it like a little sandwich.

“What?” she says, words a little garbled. There are cracker crumbs on her lips.

“Nothing,” he  says, grinning, and steals her next cracker sandwich, popping it into his mouth whole.

“Rude,” she mumbles. He reaches out, swiping the crumbs off her mouth with his thumb. Her lips open a little in surprise, and he feels the damp heat of her breath against his finger.

Bellamy pulls his hand back, clears his throat. “You, uh. There were. Crumbs.”

“Oh.” She’s quiet for a bit. “Thanks.”

“Sure,” he says. His voice sounds a little rough, and he clears his throat again.

When the snacks are gone, and Steve Rogers is flirting ineptly with his neighbor, Clarke turns down the volume a little and turns toward him.

“You never told me about your day. I assume there was more to it than paperwork and shit-talking Miller.”

“I mean, that’s most of it,” he replies, a grin tugging at the corner of his mouth. “But yeah, I got some stuff done.”

But when he tells her about his morning, about the job search, her face falls.

“Hey,” he says. She looks like she’s half a second from tearing up. He cups her shoulder, squeezing gently. “Hey, it’s not that bad. I put in five applications, and that’s just the start of it. I promise I’ll get something better than the bartending gig by the time the baby comes.”

“That’s not it,” she snaps, and Bellamy lets his hand fall away in surprise.

“Okay,” he says slowly. “You want to tell me what it is, then?”

“You’re putting applications in for jobs you don’t even _want_ ,” she says. “Why?”

“Why?” His brow furrows. “Because I want a job with better hours, better benefits. So I can be around for the kid.”

“See?”

He stares at her. “Um, no.”

“This is derailing your entire life,” she says guiltily. “If it weren’t for the baby, you—”

“Okay. I’m going to stop you right there,” he says, trying to keep his voice calm. “For one thing, I don’t especially like the job I do have, and I’d probably be stuck there for who knows how much longer if I didn’t have this motivation to look for a new one. And for another, who says I don’t want these jobs? I think the very fact that I decided to apply for them means I, on some level, want them.”

“But—” she starts, staring at her lap. He interrupts her.

“And Clarke?”

Bellamy waits until she looks at him, still frowning. “What?”

“I don’t ever want to have this conversation with you again, hearing those words come out of your mouth. The baby’s not derailing my entire life, and you’re not derailing my entire life, and I actually like my life a lot right now, okay? It might be changing direction, but I’m pretty much good with that. And me looking for a different job is just that—it’s going to be different, not worse, and I’m the one who gets to decide if it’s a job I want or don’t.”

Clarke looks like she’s shrinking more and more with every word, until she’s almost kind of curled in on herself, looking miserable. Which makes him feel like a total dick, but—as much as he likes her, this is something she has to understand.

“I’m sorry,” she says, quiet.

“I know. But Clarke, when I say ever, I mean _ever,”_ he says. “I don’t—that’s not something I ever want her to hear, okay? Even by accident. So we just shouldn’t say it.”

She looks at him for a long moment until he’s the one who feels like curling in on himself. He doesn’t have some sob story or anything; his mom was a pretty decent mom, even when she made stupid choices, even when they were pretty much broke, and his dad wasn’t ever in the picture, so it’s not like the guy could hurt his feelings when he was growing up.

But Octavia had tried to meet her dad and talk to him years ago, when she was a teenager. Bellamy had gone with her, because Aurora was just getting sick, and he didn’t want his sister to go alone.

And her dad turned out to be a huge dick, who told Octavia he’d never wanted kids, and Aurora getting pregnant with another one was never part of his plan. He’d barely tolerated Bellamy, who was generally quiet and played in his room when the man was over; and he told Octavia to her face that he’d had no desire to deal with a screaming baby. So he’d left, and he’d appreciate it if Octavia didn’t bother him again.

She cried all the way home, and it took a good month for her to stop being shy and quiet, and get back to her normal self.

He doesn’t tell Clarke any of that, not now. It’s not exactly a secret, but it makes him itchy, uncomfortable, to think of spilling his guts like that and dumping it all on her. Maybe one day, he might tell her some of it, if she wants to know.

But she seems to pick up on some of it, somehow, and she uncurls herself from her section of the couch, scoots over until she’s next to him. Bellamy watches her, a little surprised, as she hesitantly moves his arm so she can snuggle into his side, warm and close.

“Okay. I’m sorry,” she repeats. “I won’t say anything like that again.”

“You believe me?” he presses, just to make sure. It’s hard, because he’d love to just shut up and cuddle on her couch because it’s pretty awesome, generally, but he wants to make sure she knows that he really means it.

“I believe you,” she promises, and tucks herself just a little bit closer. “You’re right, and I shouldn’t have said it in the first place. I just—I just worry sometimes, because this isn’t the life I planned for myself, and I doubt it’s the life you planned, either.”

He lets himself play with her hair. It’s slippery, falling through his fingers like sand, but so soft. She still smells like paint, but beneath it she smells like fruit again, too; green apples and lemons. “Well, yeah. I didn’t actually plan to knock you up on Halloween.”

Clarke snorts, and he lets himself smile. “But plans always get fucked up. And I think wanting the life that happens is more important than holding onto the life we thought we’d live.”

She’s quiet so long he wonders if she’s fallen asleep. It _is_ later than she tends to go to bed, and he’s trying to figure out if he should just let her sleep on him for a while, like he wants, or if he should carry her to bed and let himself out when she speaks.

“I think…” she says slowly. “I think I really, really want this life, Bellamy.”

“Yeah,” he says. “Me too.”  

* * *

He ends up going home when the movie is over. It’s late, but Clarke doesn’t offer to let him sleep over, and even if she had, he would have said no. It’s way too new, even if staying over just meant him sleeping on her couch while she went upstairs alone.

Bellamy doesn’t want to take things _slow_ , exactly. She’s pregnant, and they’re having a baby together, and he’d like for them to get to a place where it’s easy and good to just _be_ together—sooner, rather than later. But he doesn’t want to rush it, either, and if he sleeps here, even on her couch, that means he’ll see her in the morning, all sleepy and warm in those _fucking_ pajamas, and he can only take so much at a time.

He’d definitely rush things if that happened. A good morning kiss could turn into a good morning makeout, and then that skinny strap of her top might slide down her arm, and what if he kissed the swell of her breast when the shirt dipped lower? What if his hands on her waist slid around, or down, and he touched on the heat of her, stroking until her head fell back and her mouth fell open in a moan, and all of the skin he could see flushed pink, and she made those sounds he only _just_ remembers from Halloween?

“Thanks for coming over,” Clarke says, standing in the doorway, oblivious to the torture that is the fantasy currently running through his mind. She shivers a little, then yawns.  

“Thanks for wanting me to come over,” he says. And he means it. _Thanks for wanting_ me, he wants to say, but that sounds a little pathetic.

But maybe she gets it. She smiles, a little sleepy, and tugs his jacket collar until he leans down far enough for her to kiss him, long and deep and slow, until his head goes fuzzy. It’s the first time she’s been the one to kiss him first, _really_ kiss him. It’s basically the best, and the look she gives him when she finally pulls back and tells him goodnight is even better.

Yeah. She probably gets it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That was about 1k words over my normal chapter goal, so I hope that helps make up for the long wait just a little bit? Maybe not. Either way, if you want to let me know your thoughts, I'd love to hear them!
> 
> I'm hoping that I might be able to speed things up a little pace-wise after this chapter. I may still spend a whole chapter on especially important days, but we'll probably see some more movement in the timeline.


	13. Chapter 13

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bellamy and Clarke meet for lunch, and talk about family.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> @myself y i k e s
> 
> I just??? Couldn't write???? For so long????? If you're still around and reading, I'm so grateful. And if you left comments on the previous chapters, know that I cherished each one, and they really did help me get out of my writing slump. 
> 
> Anyway, here's an extra-long chapter. Let me know your thoughts if you can!

Clarke has been dating Bellamy Blake for two weeks.

The first morning, he sent her a text wishing her a good morning; Raven stole her phone, saw that he’d used _:)_ instead of an actual emoji, and had teased her mercilessly for days.

“You're dating an old man,” Raven had sung while Clarke did her best to ignore her in favor of the sketch for the new middle grade novel cover contract Anya had gotten for her. “Your kid’s going to come out already demanding for everyone to get off her lawn. He's probably going to want to name her something like Edith, or Agnes.”

“Edith and Agnes are perfectly acceptable names,” Clarke had retorted. “And he’s not an old man. He’s—”

“He totally is, and you're totally into it. It's okay, Clarke. This is a judgment-free home. You're welcome to be into whatever you want, and apparently you're into hot dudes who are secretly eighty-five and incapable of using emojis—”

Raven had batted away the eraser Clarke had thrown at her, then escaped, but Clarke could hear her snickering all the way down the hall until she reached her own room.

Raven might have exaggerated, but Bellamy _is_ a little old-fashioned. More than Clarke ever expected, given the fact that they had sex in a public place the night they met.  

But in the two weeks they've officially been seeing one another, he's kissed her only a few times, and always in a way that seems like he’s being overly careful, deliberate about it. Almost like he’s holding back, though that doesn’t make much sense to her.

Maybe it’s strategic, she muses that morning, nibbling her lip as she blends the first shade of green for the ocean scene she’s painting. Raven’s already left in the power suit and heels she wears when she wants to make her male colleagues feel even less in charge during meetings, so Clarke has the house to herself, and everything is quiet except for distant melody coming from the wind chimes she hung up in the backyard last year.

Maybe it’s one of those _absence makes the heart grow fonder_ ploys. It could be part of his cunning plan to make her want him even more.

It could be working, she admits when her phone lights up with his name, and her heart practically skips a beat as it rings.

“Hello?”

“Morning, Clarke.” His voice is even more gravelly than usual, like he just woke up, and the first thing he wanted to do was call her.

Yeah, it’s definitely working.

“Hey. Late night?”

“I’ve had later,” he says, but yawns. “But yeah, there was a birthday group who didn’t understand the meaning of last call.”

She hums and starts to work the paint into the canvas. “Any luck on the job hunt?”

“A little. Hey, are you hungry?”

“I’m literally always hungry now, Bellamy,” Clarke replies. “Always.”

“Anything in particular?”

“Hmm. Chinese sounds good—ooh, or Italian.” She wets her brush with more paint. “Mmm, no, Thai. Thai sounds amazing.”

“Do you want to meet at Janya’s Thai Café for lunch?”

Clarke pauses. “For lunch?”

“You know, the meal in between breakfast and dinner. Sometimes after second breakfast and elevensies, too.”

“Nerd.” They haven’t gone out to eat yet. She’s gone over to his apartment a few times, and they’ve watched a couple movies on her TV, and twice last week they went on a walk through her neighborhood when she complained of feeling antsy. It would be...interesting, she thinks, to do something that’s definitely a bigger deal than eating Taco Bell on her couch.     

“Yeah,” she says. “I could go for Thai. Meet you there at noon?”

“Sounds good. Have fun painting.”

Clarke laughs, surprised. “How did you know I was painting? I didn’t think I mentioned it.”

“It’s in your voice,” he says, all fondness and humor and something that’s unnameable, but makes Clarke nervous—in a good way, but still nervous. “I’ve got you figured out, Griffin.”

“Oh, I see.” Her cheeks hurt, and she can only imagine how dopy she looks with the huge grin spreading across her face.

* * *

At a quarter to eleven, she covers her palette and cleans her brushes, then heads upstairs to change out of her grubby painting clothes and shower. As always, she takes an extra moment to massage her belly, trying to coax the baby into moving. It’s not really _late_ for her to be moving or turning, but it’s definitely not early, and Clarke is nearly tied in knots with anticipation.

But the baby remains quiet and still, content in Clarke’s womb, and Clarke moves on to shaving her legs while she can still reach well enough.

She has plenty of things that fit her after her trip to the mall with her friends, and she lays out a pretty top and a maxi skirt that is capable of stretching over her belly. It only took her ten minutes and three texts back and forth from Monroe— _wear the skirt it makes ur butt look good!!!!!—_ which she’s relatively proud of, but her underthings are a different story. The elastic in the waists and thighs of her panties are starting to stretch tight, just on the verge of uncomfortable. Her bras are pinching her rib cage painfully, the tender flesh of her breasts starting to spill over the cups.

“Damn it,” Clarke mutters, trying on her fourth bra. It’s the one she always called her period bra, all support and comfort, no nonsense, completely hideous, but even though it’s her best option, this one doesn’t fit quite right anymore.

She needs to buy bigger bras, and she knows she should really just go ahead and buy nursing bras at this point. She’s not going to fit back in her old bras for a long time, maybe ever, and several of her books mention expectant mothers switching over to nursing bras well before they give birth.

But—they’re just not very pretty, and even though she knows she’s going to need them eventually, she doesn’t _want_ them.

She wants pretty things. She wants to _feel_ pretty, with lace and little bows and cute patterns, especially—

Especially if someone else might be looking at them. You know, eventually.

Clarke heaves a sigh at herself, finishes adjusting the left strap, and tugs the cute striped shirt over her head.

Just because she’s pregnant and dating the father and is very, very, very interested in making out with him for a very long time and also taking his shirt off, doesn’t necessarily mean that she’s going to be jumping into bed with him anytime soon. Especially if he keeps up his slow and steady courtship routine.

He might not even _want_ that from her—she already feels huge, and all the baby books say that sometimes significant others are a weirded out by the idea of sex while their partners are pregnant. Maybe Bellamy feels that way. She couldn’t hold it against him, not really. Maybe that’s the real reason he’s being so sweet and so _slow_ about everything between them, not because he’s being careful.

And she _wants_ him, but she doesn’t want to screw things up between them by jumping into anything too soon. It’s already so much, so fast, and she’s just—

She’s scared.

Things could be so, so good, or they could go down in flames.

So. She’s not going to rush things. She’s _not_.

But she _is_ going to buy some pretty bras.

(Just in case.)

* * *

She makes herself wait as long as possible, but even with the Tuesday lunch rush, it’s not a long drive to Janya’s and Clarke gets to the restaurant almost fifteen minutes early. And even though it’s silly, a quick buzz of disappointment zips through her when she sees he's not there yet.

March is finally warming up, but still barely in the seventies—yet the restaurant is frigid, blasting air from the A/C like it’s the middle of July instead of not even April. Clarke fights the urge to shiver while she waits at a little table for four right against the window. It’s funny, she thinks, that she was toasty warm all winter as the baby grew, and yet she’s getting the chills from a Thai restaurant.

“Hey,” she hears, and sees Bellamy shrugging off his jacket as he crosses over to her table. “Sorry I’m late,” he adds, and after a second of hesitation, ducks down to kiss her on the mouth in greeting.

She’s still smiling when he sits down. “You are literally ten minutes early, Bellamy.”

He grins. It’s a little lopsided, and his teeth are bright against his skin.

He’s beautiful.

She hopes their baby looks like him.

The thought startles her, and she casts her eyes down at her menu. It’s not _wrong_ to want the baby to look like him. Look at him. Look at his sister. The genetic perfection is undeniable. What mother _wouldn’t_ want her daughter to experience the same good fortune?

“Clarke?”

“Huh?”

Bellamy’s still smiling at her, but it’s a little puzzled. “I was asking how your morning was.”

“Oh. Oh, it was fine. I painted, I peed like seven times, I painted some more. I’m trying to get as much done as possible before the baby comes, so I don’t have to feel guilty taking so much time off.”

The waiter comes up to their table and she offers them an absent smile as she orders her favorite spicy eggplant dish, and Bellamy asks for one of their soups.

“Taking so much time off?” Bellamy repeats when they’re alone again. “How much time were you going to take off?”

“I don’t know for sure. The first few months, I’ll definitely be completely off work. It’ll be tricky enough trying to figure out the whole new mom, new baby thing without trying to paint in between diaper changes. Then I’ll see about taking on a few contracts, little things that don’t require too much time.”

Bellamy nods, and reaches across the table to take her hand. His fingers are warm, and he frowns when he registers just how cold she is.

“Jesus, Clarke,” he mutters, and starts briskly rubbing his hands over hers. “What did you do, stick your hands in ice?”

“It’s cold in here!” she protests. “How is that my fault?”

He shakes his head, releases her hand, and stands up.

“Bellamy?”

Grabbing his jacket, he rounds the table and drapes his coat over her shoulders before sitting down right next to her and reclaiming her hand.

“Oh god. Are we really going to be _that_ couple?” She’d always secretly made fun of those couples who had a whole table or booth to themselves, but still insisted on sitting next to one another, practically in each other’s lap. It was sweet, she guessed, but it always seemed excessive.

He raises and drops a shoulder nonchalantly, but she sees his cheeks darken with a blush.

“Yeah. What does it matter?”

The jacket smells like him. Something boyish, soap and boy deodorant and something else altogether. And it’s warm now, with the coat and his body radiating warmth into her side, her hands slowly heating under his touch.

“I guess it doesn’t,” she replies. And she might lean into him. Just a little.

He’s solid, almost a little stiff, and then she can feel him relax, hear the smile when he prompts her to speak again.

“You were talking about after the baby comes?”

“Oh. Yeah, just the thing about work. I know Raven and Monroe will help where they can, and—and you, of course,” Clarke adds, stumbling a little. “But I know it’ll be a lot, trying to figure out why she’s crying or when she should be sleeping or why she won’t eat when she’s supposed to, and I just don’t want to have to worry about work for a while.”

“Your mom isn’t going to help?”

It’s clearly an innocent question, but Clarke stiffens; she can’t help it.

“No.”

Bellamy’s hands still on hers for just a second, then resume. “No?” His voice is careful. Bland.

“Yeah, no, she’s not—I’m not about to call her and ask her to teach me to be a good mom,” Clarke says. She can’t prevent the laugh that escapes her, and she knows Bellamy’s taken aback by the sound. He drops her hand, and the legs of his chair screech as he scoots back to see her face better.

“Okay, we’re still in the early stages of this relationship, but I’m not really sure how you expect me to not respond to something like that,” he says.

“It’s nothing,” Clarke says. Her throat feels tight, which is _stupid_. She’s so tired of feeling like this whenever her mother comes up. “I just have a hard time picturing her as interested in helping out with this.”

He just stares at her, and she feels her face heat even as the irritation rises with the color in her cheeks.

“What?” she snaps when he just keeps staring.

“Have you—” A furrow is forming in his brow, all puzzlement and concern. “Have you even asked?”

She looks away.

“Have you even _told_ her?” Bellamy asks, the incredulity rising in his tone.

Her chest feels tight now too. It’s not guilt. It’s _not_. There’s no reason she should feel guilty about not telling her mom about the baby yet. She hardly even tell her mother anything about herself anymore, and her mother definitely never asks. There's no law that says Clarke _had_ to have told her about the baby by now, or even has to tell her ever.

“Oh my god, Clarke.”

“It’s not a big deal.”

“What? God, my sister was the first one I called,” Bellamy says. “But if my mom were alive, I’d have talked to her first.”

“Yeah, well, my mom isn’t exactly the most doting and generous of mothers,” Clarke mutters.

She stares down at the tabletop rather than look at Bellamy. For some reason, even though it’s a Thai restaurant, the placemats are the same Chinese zodiac ones at all the dim sum places downtown. Her mother was born in the year of the snake. According to the placemat, the baby is going to be born in the year of the goat.

Bellamy snorts. “Whose mom actually is?”

She glances up at him. “What?”

He huffs. “I’m not—look, I obviously don’t know what your mom is like, or what she did. And I’m on _your_ side, always. But…even though I loved my mom, and she did her best, she wasn’t perfect either. But she’s also still my mom, and if she were alive I know she’d want to know that she’s going to be a grandmother. I know _I’d_ want her to know,” he adds, and shakes his head. “Your mom is the only grandmother our kid is going to get, and I never got to know my grandparents, so—I guess I just can’t understand why you wouldn’t want to give her that, if you could.”

His voice is raw by the end, and the tightness in her chest is definitely guilt now.

“Bellamy—”

“Tom kha soup? Spicy basil eggplant?”

They both look up at the waiter, who’s watching them expectantly, steaming dishes in hand.

“Um—I ordered the eggplant,” Clarke says.

Their food is deposited in front of them, and the silence is thick until Bellamy sighs.

“Look, we can talk about this later, right? Let’s just eat.”

He looks at her warily, like he thinks she’s going to argue. She guesses she can’t quite blame him for that, given their history so far. But she just nods, then hesitantly reaches out and squeezes his hand.

“Okay,” Clarke replies. “Let’s eat.”

* * *

They talk about Octavia and Lincoln’s plans for the elementary school’s spring break (they’re going to Tahoe), about the concert Monroe and Murphy went to last weekend (Monroe screamed Murphy deaf when she saw the headlining band come on stage), about the puppy Clarke saw yesterday on her way to bring Raven the lunch she forgot (it was wearing a raincoat), about whether or not Bellamy likes the name Edith (“Uh...yeah? It’s cute, I guess”). They eat, and they talk, and they very carefully don’t discuss anything to do with mothers or grandparents or secrets or hurt until they’ve split the bill and walked out of the freezing restaurant into the—blissfully, thankfully—warm March day.

“I still have a couple hours until my shift,” Bellamy says, and holds out his hand. “You want to walk?”

She doesn’t answer except to slip her hand into his and lace their fingers together as they start down the block.

“So. You haven’t told your mom. That you’re _pregnant_.”

Clarke winces. “I just don’t really want to talk about it, okay?” she says, pleading.

After a moment of quiet, he says, “It’s not really okay. I mean, I get that we don’t know each other really well yet, and that we come from different backgrounds, but...but not talking to me about this, at least not giving me _anything_ to go on here, it doesn’t really feel like ‘giving this thing a chance,’ Clarke.”

She wants to retort, prove him wrong, but—

Damn it.   

“Okay.” Clarke lets out a long breath. “Okay, that’s fair.”

He’s patiently silent while she tries to figure it out. What to say, how to explain.

“I haven’t seen my mom in three years,” she says eventually. “Since I graduated from college, got my inheritance, and told her I was moving up here.”

He squeezes her hand.

“No visits?”

“No.” She shakes her head, and they pause to let another couple, one with a baby strapped to her chest and the other with a toddler on his hip, cross in front of them to reach a café. “She doesn’t like northern California, and she never wanted to come here. And it didn’t feel like home anymore down there—when she remarried, after my dad, she and Marcus bought a new home across the city from the house I grew up in.”

“That sucks,” he says, genuine, and she offers him a small smile.

“Yeah. And she just—she did it without telling me, when I was at college, and I was so _angry_. And then I changed my major, and _she_ was so pissed, and you’d have thought it was the stupidest thing I could have ever done, and we just—we don’t really talk anymore. We’re too good at hurting each other when we do, so we just don't.”

He’s so solid at her side and his hand is so warm in hers and his silence is so comforting, so encouraging, that she can’t stop the tide of words now that they’ve started.

“And it’s like, she’s never going to _approve_ of what I do, or who am I, or what I love. My major was wrong, my job is wrong, my home is wrong. Everything is _wrong_ to her, and I just don’t want to tell her about the baby, and about you, and have to listen to her tell me why another thing that I _love_ is so goddamn _wrong_.”

She turns to look at him, a sudden, furious sheen of tears in her eyes, and he slides his free palm over her jaw to her cheek and kisses her firmly. He kisses her until she sighs, and the tears melt away without spilling, and she feels tired, but at least she doesn’t feel wound so tight she’s about to snap.

Eventually, he pulls away, and smooths a strand of her hair back behind her ear as she blinks at him.

“It’s not wrong, Clarke,” Bellamy says, soft. “Even if she tried to say it is, it’s not wrong.”

Clarke leans forward and lets her forehead rest against his chest for a moment. When she turns her head, she can hear his heart beating under her ear.

“I know,” she replies finally. “I know it’s right.”

“Good.” He wraps his arms around her and squeezes for a moment, then lets her go. “But—you know, she could surprise you. Maybe. If you gave her the chance.”

“Yeah. Maybe.”

Probably not, but.

Just maybe.

* * *

Clarke agrees, if not to call her mother, at least to consider it more than she was before; Bellamy seems satisfied enough, and once they walk around the capitol mall and back to their cars, he kisses her goodbye and leaves to get ready for his shift at Grounders.

Once she's in her own car, she still feels a little tired, but mostly she's just restless, so instead of going home she drives to The Artery. It's in the next town over to the west, and takes longer to get to than Michael’s or other big box craft supply stores, but she goes there whenever she can. It's locally owned, and cleverly designed, and staffed by people who actually know what they're talking about in terms of the supplies they stock.

When she was little and started coloring on every single thing she wasn’t supposed to, her father had taken her to a tiny little shop on Balboa Island to buy her first real sketchbook. There was a boy working behind the counter, and her father read the boy’s name off his nametag. Jake never once forgot it over the next ten years of taking Clarke to that store to buy pastels, paints, pencils. And he’d taught Clarke that the place, and the people, are just as important as the things you go there to buy.

Clarke went back there only once after her father and Wells died. The boy, Miles, had become a man, with a little boy of his own coloring behind the front counter, and he’d asked after her father by name.

The bell over the door chimes brightly, and as Clarke waves to the familiar face at the front register, she thinks, not for the first time, that her father would like The Artery.

“Hey, Maya.”

“Hi Clarke!” Maya says, and is in the middle of asking Clarke how she is when her eyes widen and she trails off, gaze stuck on Clarke’s middle.

Clarke looks down reflexively. “Oh. Yeah, this is a thing now.”

“Oh god, sorry,” Maya says. “I didn’t mean to stare like such an idiot.”

“No, it's fine. I guess it's just been longer since I've been here than I thought.” Her hand goes to the swell of its own volition.

Maya smiles. “Well, congratulations. When is the baby due?”

“She’ll be here end of July,” Clarke replies, and at that Maya beams.

“Only four more months! That's so exciting.”

“And terrifying.”

“Oh, yeah, of course.”

She browses the shop, which is a little trickier than it used to be—the aisles are narrow, crammed with art supplies, and she's significantly wider than she used to be.

But she manages, and gets caught up in reading all the names on the tubes of paint. She mixes her colors more often than not, but she likes treating herself to pretty paints every now and then, and her dad would always make her laugh by trying to guess the names before actually checking the label, each proposed name more absurd than the last.

The actual names on the paint tubes seem almost as silly as the punny ones Jake used to guess, and even as it makes Clarke smile, part of her aches.

It aches and throbs and _hurts_ that her father is still gone, and is always going to be gone, and that he’s not here with her, making dumb dad jokes about art supplies. It aches the way a sore tooth does, or the way a bone that healed wrong feels when it’s about to rain, and it’s even worse when she remembers the ache in Bellamy’s voice when he talked about his mother, and how he wishes he could tell her about the baby.

Clarke wishes she could tell her dad about the baby.

She sets the tube of _oh snap! pea green_ back in the display.

Maybe Bellamy does have a point. Her mom could be shitty and judgmental about the baby, but—maybe she wouldn’t. Or even if she was, maybe it would only be to Clarke. Maybe she’d be a good grandmother to Clarke’s daughter. She’s heard of plenty of mediocre mothers turning out to be doting grandmothers.

It’s kind of hard to imagine Abby Griffin as one of them, but it’s technically _possible._

At the very least, if Clarke decides to tell her mother, Marcus would probably be excited about the baby. She might not have been pleased when her mother remarried, but Marcus was always on Clarke’s side for things that really mattered.

Whatever. She told Bellamy she’d think about it. She’s thinking about it. That’s it.

Once she's at the register with a new brush she's been eyeing for a year and a couple new paints with names like _rock-a-bye baby blue_ and _you are my sunshine yellow,_ Maya says cheerfully, “I didn't even realizing you were seeing someone.”

Maya wraps the brush and carefully places it in the bag, then smiles when she sees the paints Clarke picked out. Meanwhile Clarke blanks on how to answer her.

“We, uh. It was—it _is_ new,” she eventually manages. “This wasn't exactly planned, but—the dad is a good guy, so we’re making the best of it.”

“Well, I’m glad to hear it,” Maya says, then adds, “Looks like your total is $29.01.”

Clarke frowns. The brush is definitely more than twenty-five all by itself, and the paints aren’t cheap.

“I think you forgot the acrylics?”

“Nope. They’re my gift to you, okay?”

“Maya, you really don’t have to,” Clarke starts, but Maya shakes her head.

“Of course I don’t,” she says, practical. “That’s what makes it a gift. Now take them, or I’m going to be offended.”

Clarke cracks a smile at that. “Alright. I appreciate it, even though you _really_ didn’t have to.”

Maya fakes a yawn as she ignores Clarke’s protests, and Clarke sighs and reaches across the counter as best she can with her belly in the way so she can hug Maya in thanks.

The woman hugs her back, and she says, “You look wonderful, Clarke. I hope things keep going well with the dad.”  

“I think they will,” Clarke says, and it feels good to realize that when she says it, she believes it.

* * *

“Hey babe,” Raven calls absently when Clarke gets home. Her afternoon meeting must have gotten over early for her to be home already.

“Hey.” Clarke wanders into the kitchen, over to the counter where Raven’s frowning at her laptop, and props her chin on Raven’s shoulder to peer at the screen.

It makes pretty much zero sense to Clarke, some kind of schematic for some kind of device that does something terrifying, she’s sure.

“How was work?”

“Eh. Men know nothing, I tell men they know nothing, men get offended when I prove they know nothing,” Raven says, and makes a note that reads like complete gibberish on the word document she’s got open next to the schematic.

“So just a normal Tuesday.”

“Just a normal Tuesday.” Raven types another note and hits enter with a particularly emphatic jab. Then she leans her head against Clarke’s. “You okay?”

After thinking about it for a moment, she nods, and straightens up. “Yeah, I’m good. But I think I’m going to go veg upstairs, okay?”

“Okay, but only for a couple hours,” Raven says sternly, swiveling on her stool and pointing at Clarke. “I’m making chile verde enchiladas for dinner, and it’s your duty to eat at least half the pan and then tell me how amazing I am.”

Clarke smiles. “Don’t I always?”

She makes the trek up the stairs to her room—even though she takes her time, she’s _still_ a little bit winded at the top, and she is not looking forward to taking those stairs while she gets bigger every day— and turns on her ceiling fan before settling on her bed with her laptop.

The TV gets turned to _HGTV_ , but she doesn’t pay much attention. Instead, as the blades of the fan rotate with a soft clicking sound, she opens her computer, hesitates, and then brings up Facebook.

Her mother was most recently tagged in a photo of herself and Marcus dressed to the nines at a fundraising gala—the caption says all proceeds of the gala go to support research of spinal muscular atrophy.  Clarke chews on the inside of her cheek. She hadn’t thought about it in a long time, but her mother always said yes to the SMA galas and fundraisers. 

The photo was posted by someone involved in the gala planning, and when Clarke scrolls down the page, it’s more of the same—a lot of activity, but none of it actually from Abby.

Most of the posts are pictures other people are putting up, and in every one of them, her mother is beautiful, composed, but rarely smiling.

But Clarke is surprised to see how much older she looks. It’s only been three years since she left Los Angeles, but there are fine lines around Abby’s mouth and eyes and forehead that Clarke has never seen before. Before she can stop the thought, it crosses her mind.

She looks old enough to be a grandmother.

Clarke shoves the thought out of her mind for now and scrolls back to the top, to look at the gala picture again. The slightest smile curves her mother’s lips as she looks up at Marcus—his face is expressive as ever, and he’s beaming at her mother. They’re holding hands.

* * *

Through two and a half episodes of _Fixer Upper_ and three whole chile verde enchiladas and two virgin mojitos, she can’t stop thinking about that picture.

When her mother remarried so quickly on the heels of her father’s death, it had made her question whether her mother’s love for her father was as strong as she’d always thought it was. What else could it have meant, that she loved another man enough to marry him so fast?

But now—now that she’s been away from it a little longer, and with that picture sticking in her mind, maybe…maybe it didn’t mean anything other than that her mother was lucky. That she was lucky, and she’d met someone else to love that much.

Or maybe Clarke’s hormonal, and emotional from talking about her mother to Bellamy, and she’s just missing her dad, and she’s going to wake up tomorrow laughing about how ridiculously maudlin she’s being tonight.

But…still, that photo sticks with her.

In her adult life, she never expected to be _jealous_ of her mother. Irritated with her, for sure; basically any emotion on the negative end of the spectrum is fair game when it comes to Clarke and her mother. But in a strange way, the longer that picture is stuck in her head, the itchier it makes her, until she realizes..she thinks she wants what they have in it. Abby and Marcus are surrounded by people, hundreds of them at least, but they might as well be the only people on the planet for as much attention as they’re paying to anything else.

Clarke wants that. She wants someone to look at her that way, and she wants to look at someone that way, and feel so special and excited and content, all at once. The anticipation, the delight.

It’s not that Clarke wants or expects to go out every Friday night for dancing, or a romantic candlelit dinner, or a black tie gala. That’s not her, or Bellamy; it’s not _them_. She _likes_ watching movies and eating takeout on her couch with Bellamy next to her, and she likes reading her good morning texts from him as soon as she wakes up, and she likes hearing his voice on the phone, and meeting him for Thai food, and walking through town with his hand in hers.

But…she might like an actual real date-date, too.

Clarke huffs and pulls her cell phone off her nightstand to check the time. It’s just about the time he takes his second break, and if she dials right now, she could talk to him.

A relationship. They’re in a relationship now, and even if Bellamy had been the one to do the convincing, to push for it, she’s committed to it too, now. She’s an equal partner, and if she wants something, there’s no reason why she can’t just goddamn ask for it.

She put his contact info in her favorites list last week, and it takes her seconds to call. The phone rings once, twice, three times—

“Hello?”

Clarke licks her lips, her mouth suddenly gone dry.

“Hey.”

“Hey, Clarke. Wha—”

“Will you go on a date with me?” she blurts out. A second of stunned silence is enough to spur her on. “Like, a real date, where we dress up and go somewhere where the only other people are on dates too, and—”

“Yes.”

“I—yes?”

His voice is low and sweet, like honey warmed in her favorite tea. “Yes, I’ll go on a date with you. That sounds nice.”

“Oh.”

He laughs a little, and the sound seems to make Clarke’s belly tremble, like some mutated giant butterflies are trapped inside, fluttering around. “Wow, don’t sound so excited. Did you already change your mind?”

“No,” Clarke says, smiling her own little smile as she scratches her belly lightly, like it will soothe the strange butterfly flutters. “I guess I didn’t expect you to agree so easily.”

“Clarke, literally any circumstance in which I’m spending time with you is good to me. Plus, I wanted to go on a ‘real date’ with you,” he adds, teasing. “You just beat me to the punch.”

She sniffs dramatically, but she’s grinning as she replies, “You snooze, you lose, Blake.”

“Yeah, well. It doesn’t really feel like losing.”

The mutant butterflies in her stomach agree. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Spinal Muscular Atrophy (SMA) is the top genetic cause of death in children and infants. To learn more about it, and ways in which you can help, visit [CureSMA.org](http://www.curesma.org/sma/about-sma/).
> 
> It's been so long that I contradicted the posted story probably a dozen times while writing this chapter. Hopefully I caught all the issues. ;) This should also (I think) be the last dramatic discussion for a while.


	14. Chapter 14

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bellamy and Clarke go on a date; Bellamy gets a call.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> me @ me: yikes but better late than never, I guess??

Bellamy asks Clarke is she has anything special in mind for their date, and when she admits she doesn’t have anything planned yet, he gets her to promise to let him plan their big date as a surprise without much convincing.

It doesn’t take long before he can tell she’s starting to regret it.

Not in a bad way, really; it’s actually kind of cute, how antsy she is about finding out what they’re doing, and how she tries to wheedle details out of him, dropping hints about the kind of music she likes and trying to figure out where he likes to eat.

“You’ll find out on Saturday,” he finally tells her the next day when she comes over to his apartment for lunch. He’d made pizza from scratch, mostly because she’s been craving the fresh mozzarella, but also because his pizza is pretty damn impressive, and he’s never been above using his talents in the kitchen to impress a girl. They’re eating on the couch, cross-legged and tucked into the corners so they can face each other. “Stop trying to be sneaky.”

“Saturday?” Clarke pauses in nibbling the remaining crust of her pizza.

“Yeah. Does that work for you?”

She nods. “Sure—what time?”

“Nine a.m.”

Clarke raises her eyebrows. “Nine _a.m._?”

He grins at her incredulous tone. “Yeah, uh—I was hoping you’d let me have a whole day.”

“Wow. Yeah, okay. Sure. I can block out the whole day,” she says. Then she asks, “What should I wear?”

He shakes his head. “Nope. You’re not getting it out of me that easily.”

“Bellamy, come on!”

“Just dress in something comfortable,” he says. “You’ll be fine.”

“First of all, nothing is comfortable anymore,” she says. “Second of all, that tells me _nothing._ Does that mean be comfortable in a dress the size of Russia because we’re going somewhere too classy for jeans? Or does it mean be comfortable in sweats because classy is overrated?”

He takes their empty plates and sets them on the end table when she starts ranting, and pulls her feet into his lap.

“Some of both.” She makes an outraged sound, and he laughs. “Seriously, I’m pretty sure I recall you asking for dressing up and going to a fancy date location. So we’re going to do that, but also some other stuff.”

Clarke sighs heavily, but a smile tugs up her mouth when he tells her he remembers what she asked for.

“Just wear whatever you want,” he says, massaging her arches. “You’ll be beautiful in anything.”

She groans, and flops back against the arm of the couch, throwing an arm over her face. He can see the outline of her belly button through the UCLA t-shirt stretching tight over her midsection, and he smiles.

“You’re such a boy,” Clarke says, voice muffled but disgusted. A moment later she adds, peeking out at him,“But that feels nice. Thank you.”

He leans over, kisses her. Her mouth is soft against his, and she tastes a little bit like the sauce he’d made from scratch for the pizza, sweet and a little tart from the fresh tomatoes.

“You’re welcome.”

* * *

He has Raven’s number only because she’d texted him with vague threats a few times—mostly in good fun, he _thinks_ —so on Thursday night, he texts her his plans for the date and asks her for help packing Clarke a bag for the day.

She tells him she’ll sneak the bag with her to work, and to pick it up at three. When he shows up, the glare off the glass building is nearly blinding, all the cars parked in the attached parking structure shiny and expensive.

“Shit,” he says, climbing out of his crappy Toyota and staring at the perfectly restored Impala next to him.

“Don’t be fooled by the pretty cars,” he hears, and turns to see Raven walking toward him, the heels on her boots clicking with every step. “The owners are all assholes.”

“Yeah, I figured. The pretty cars were actually what tipped me off,” he says.

Raven’s smile is as beautiful and sharp as ever as she pops the trunk on the least ostentatious car in the lot. It’s still well-maintained and gleams in the sun, but it’s not anywhere near as ridiculous as the others.

“You sure about this?” she asks, handing him a large tote bag. It’s decorated all over with little cherries and says _Mon Cherry Amor_ in a curly font on the front. “She _might_ hate this and/or kill you. You realize that, right?”

“Thanks for not telling me about your concerns until just now,” Bellamy replies, dry. “But yeah, I’m taking a chance and hoping she likes it anyway.”

“You have balls, Blake. I’ll give you that. But I’d say your odds are about 70/30,” Raven replies.

“Your faith in me is touching.”

* * *

Even though he’d played it off with Raven, he _is_ nervous as he pulls up in front of Clarke’s house the next morning. What if she hates the idea? What if she’s miserable all day?

Bellamy knocks on her door and is still worrying until she opens it, smiling.

“Morning.”

“Morning,” he says, smiling back automatically. Then he smiles wider when she stands on her toes to kiss him firmly, then pulls the door shut behind her.

“Is this going to work?” she asks, gesturing at herself. She’s wearing leggings, as usual, with sparkly sandals and a pretty top a few shades brighter than her eyes.

“Got a sweater?” he asks; she raises an eyebrow and pats her purse.

“Yes,” she says. It’s already over eighty degrees outside even though it’s just past nine—a taste of the coming summer.

Bellamy grins at her and doesn’t explain. “Then you’re great. You ready?”

Clarke adjusts the strap of her purse on her shoulder, and her hand finds his, cool and small. He runs a thumb over her knuckles.

“Ready.”

He holds open her door for her as she climbs in. As she fastens her seatbelt, she has to tug the lower strap until it sits under the swell of her belly.

Bellamy remembers how it felt under his hand, weeks ago now, taut and warm through her dress, and something in him aches.

“It’s almost time for your next appointment, right?” he asks when he slides into his own seat and starts the car.

“Next Thursday, 3:15,” she replies, a little distracted, and when he glances at her, she’s craning her neck to look into the backseat.

There are some beach towels, a couple grocery bags stuffed full, an additional small ice chest.

“What’s all that for?” she asks, face puzzled. “Are we going to the river?”

He feels itchy, almost nervous to tell her, even though she agreed to let him plan the day, and they’re already in the car on the way there. Bellamy signals to merge onto the freeway.

“Not exactly,” he says.

She frowns and ducks a little so she can see the freeway signs as they pass under them. “Is there a lake this way? I didn’t think there was, at least not close.”

“There are some, but yeah, nowhere really close,” Bellamy replies. “But we’re not going to the lake.”

“ _Bellamy_ ,” she says, half laughing, and Bellamy would like to always hear her like this, smiling and happy and even a little exasperated with him. She just sounds happy, and he likes that.

“I was thinking about a picnic on the beach for lunch,” he says.

“The beach?”

He nods, chances another glance at her. Clarke is staring at him.

“Like, the _beach_ -beach?”

He nods again.

“Are you crazy?” she demands. “We’re not going to the ocean. Are we going to the ocean?”

“To start,” Bellamy replies, and starts to laugh when she reaches over and pokes him.

“Don’t _lie_ ,” she says. “We’re not going to the ocean.” The delight in her voice outweighs the disbelief of her words, and for the first time all week, he relaxes completely.

He made the right call.

“I’m not lying,” he promises. “As long as you don’t decide you can’t stand to ride in the car with me for that long, we’ll be in San Francisco in about a little less than two hours. Oh, and we can stop as often as you want—we don’t have any solid plans for the morning, so we won’t be late for anything. And I packed snacks, too, in case you get hungry; there are apples and cookies and guacamole. That type of stuff.”

“Bellamy,” Clarke says again; this time her voice is so impossibly fond, he can feel himself flushing. “You’re _ridiculous_.”

He flashes an embarrassed grin her way. “Yeah, well. Figured you might as well know what you’re getting into.”

She slips her hand into his as the city traffic evens out and they speed up, heading west.

“I’m not worried about it,” she replies.

* * *

They stop only once, at the Jelly Belly outlet store, so Clarke can get a bag of the deformed Jelly Bellies they sell there and use the bathroom. By the time they reach the Bay Bridge, a third of the bag is gone, and Bellamy is frankly amazed that Clarke hasn’t made herself sick on them.

“Oh, hey, let me get the toll,” Clarke says, reaching into the back for her bag.

“Nah, I’ve got it.”

“Bellamy, come on,” she replies. A flurry of punch cards, dollar bills, and doodles on scraps of paper fall out of her wallet when she unclasps the buckle and starts digging. “You’re already paying for all the gas. I can—”

“I’ve got it,” he repeats, a little louder.

“Here, see, I’ve even got six bucks ready—”

“Clarke!” He doesn’t mean to bark, but there’s conspicuous silence in the car afterward.

They’re barely inching along, paused in the long lines leading through the bridge toll booths, so he can look over at her. She’s frowning at him.

He lets out a breath. “Sorry.”

“It’s really no big deal, Bellamy,” she says slowly.

He bites the inside of his cheek to keep himself from immediately snapping back at her. Because she’s right. Six measly bucks for a bridge toll isn’t a big deal, not really.

But it feels like a big deal. He’s in charge of planning this day, and she asked for it to be special, and he knows perfection is supposedly overrated and all that shit, but he still has an idea of how things will go, and that idea includes him taking care of everything. Even the stupid bridge toll. He just wants to prove, even if it’s just for a day, that he can take care of everything. Give her everything she wants.

“I know,” he says eventually, and reaches over to take her hand. “Could you let me take care of it anyway? This time?”

Her eyes search his face. “Okay,” she says, squeezing his hand. “Sure.”

“Thanks.”

She smiles at him and shoves all the flotsam and jetsam back into her wallet.

They get through the toll, her handing him his wallet to pay, and are nearly into the city when she adds, “Next date, I’m paying though. You’re just going to have to deal with it.”

 _Next date_. He doesn’t even bother to hide his grin, just holds out his hand again, and her fingers curl through his immediately. “You’ve got a deal.”

* * *

He parks them on a section of the bay where they can see the Golden Gate, but the tourists aren’t out in full force like they are deeper into the wharf. There’s a walking and biking path separating the road from actual sand, and Clarke actually squeaks a little in excitement when he turns off the car.

“Come on, we should probably get some real food into you to counteract all those jelly beans,” he says. She insists on helping, and takes the beach towels and her own purse while he hauls the ice chest and bags of food he packed.

“Oh,” she sighs, looking out at the ocean. It’s windy today, and the water’s a little choppy, but there are plenty of boats on the water, sailing boats or the big barges of tourists going out to Alcatraz. She turns her head and gives him a dazzling smile. “This is perfect.”

“It’ll be more perfect with food,” Bellamy says temptingly, and between them they get a little picnic set up.

“I really like where I live,” Clarke says a sandwich and half a bag of chips later. The wind is whipping her hair into tangles around her face, chapping her cheeks red. “But every time I see the ocean, I realize how much I’ve missed it.”

He licks his lips, partly to get all the stray mustard, partly because he’s not sure if she’s okay with talking about her family again yet. He settles for, “You grew up by the ocean, right?”

“Yeah. Newport Beach. I could see the water from every window in the house.” For the first time since he’s known her, her voice sounds wistful when she talks about where she grew up.

“Why didn’t you settle someplace on the coast when you graduated?” he asks curiously.

She shrugs. “Monroe’s family was up here, and she wanted to come back. I wanted to get away from my mom, but I’d tried out other states during spring breaks and summer trips, and I couldn’t imagine being happy in any of them. So when Raven got offered a job here too, I figured it was far enough and different enough from Orange County that I would be happy.”

“You could have lived here, in the Bay,” he points out. It’s not that far from her friends.

She just shakes her head, smiles a little. “No. I think I ended up right where I should have.”

After they finish the early lunch and watch the paddle boarders in the bay for a while, he tempts her back to the car, though he has to help hoist her to her feet, the sand too slippery for her to manage on her own very well while keeping her balance. They spend the afternoon slipping in between tourists and locals, taking her to Chinatown for the sweet red bean buns, and to the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, where they spend an hour longer that he planned for, and to the Palace of Fine Arts.

Then they drive out of the city along the pacific highway, down into a little town where his mother brought him when he was young, and she’d told him his grandfather had lived there when he was alive. They stop at the beach all the local artisans frequented to collect the sea glass that gathered there, and then go over the hills into the little town that sells freshly baked bread studded with artichoke hearts and chunks of parmesan cheese. Clarke tugs him across the street when she sees the baby goats at the farm that makes fancy goat cheeses for the rich retirees who liked to settle in the area for a few years before they decided it’s a bit too cold and rustic of a place for them. She picks out a honey lavender log of cheese for Raven, and buys little medallion-sized samples of all the other fancy flavors for Murphy.

“He’d love this place,” she explains as he refills the ice chest with ice from the general store. “The restaurant’s always trying to source things from local, small businesses. And he’s a cheese snob.”

Bellamy snorts, and Clarke grins.

“Oh, that reminds me,” she says. “I told Monroe that you’re taking me to San Francisco, and she told Murphy, and now Murphy would like me to tell you that if I’m not at their apartment for lunch tomorrow, he will find you and kill you.”

“Noted.”

She catches his hand once he hauls the ice chest into the backseat again, tugging him over to her. Her belly presses against his front.

“This has been a really good day.”

He ducks his head to kiss her, and she smiles against his mouth, and he smiles back.

She makes a small sound after a moment, and he kisses her again, sliding his hand into her sea-tangled hair, but she grabs his wrist and halts the movement as she pulls back a little.

“Clarke?”

Her gaze is focused, staring intently somewhere toward his collarbone, though she doesn’t really seem to be looking at _him._

“Clarke,” he says, a little more alarmed when she doesn’t reply. “Are you okay?”

“I—yeah, sorry,” she says slowly, and looks up at him. “I—I think the baby’s moving.”

He stares at her. “What?”

She laughs a little, the sound still more surprised than anything. “Yeah, I—I’m pretty sure she’s kicking or turning or something. It’s been happening for a few days but I thought they were just butterflies, but just now it happened again, and I—I’m pretty sure it’s her.”

Her eyes are brimming, and things are a little blurry for him too, and then he whoops, grabbing her and spinning her in a circle as she laughs.

* * *

At the restaurant he picked for the evening, he hands her the bag Raven packed and Clarke gives him a look.

“Don't look at me; you were the one who was so obsessed with what you should wear. I just wanted to make sure you had what you needed,” he says innocently.

“Uh huh,” she replies dryly. “Thanks.”

They part ways; he changes into a fresh button down and makes an attempt to make his hair do anything vaguely tidy.

“Nope,” he says, resigned, and leaves the bathroom to wait for Clarke.

Even if he had managed to tame his hair, he'd have ruined it with how many times he runs his hands through it as he waits and fidgets.

Then the door opens, and she's wearing a black dress that dips between her breasts, skims over her belly, and floats around her knees; light glints against the sparkly little gems at her ears and throat, and she's done something with her hair, braiding it up like a crown.

He realizes he's staring, even a little open-mouthed, when she lets out a soft snort.

“Sorry, uh—you look beautiful,” he blurts.

“Mm. You're pretty too,” she replies. “So, do I have you to thank for packing me fancy underwear, or…?”

“I—huh? What? No! I—Raven—” he breaks off when she grins, and glares at her. “Not funny.”

“It was kind of funny,” she says, and steps forward to take his arm.

Her hand has been on him in much more intimate places, but the confident pressure of her fingers on his arm is what makes his heart practically skip a beat. It feels like they belong there, like they belong together.

Bellamy clears his throat. “So, I’ve never actually been to this place, but Yelp says it’s the best Italian in the Bay Area, so…”

“Good. I'm starving.”

“You ate half a loaf of bread just an hour ago,” he says, and gives their names to the host.

She looks up at him as they're being led to a table. There are fresh tulips on each table, and the lighting is soft and low. “Listen, I've become a human garbage disposal, but it's basically your fault? So I'd keep my mouth shut if I were you.”

“Noted,” he says, and scoots in her chair. “So, fancy underwear, huh?”

She laughs.

* * *

The food is good, and they turn into one of _those_ couples Clarke makes fun of again, the ones who hold hands across the tables and try each other’s food and keep making each other laugh. They're in the middle of dessert when his phone lights up with an unfamiliar number calling.

Clarke notices when he frowns down at it.

“Something wrong?”

“No,” he says. “I just don't know who it is.” He always puts people in his contacts right away, but it could be Octavia, if her phone was lost and she might have an emergency, and—

“Answer it, Bellamy,” Clarke says, fond.

“Sorry,” he mouths, scooting out from the table, then says, “Hello?” as he walks toward the entrance.

“Hello, I’m calling for Bellamy Blake?”

“This is he.” If this is a telemarketer, he swears to god—

“I’m calling from American River Community College. You applied for the adjunct faculty position in the history department and we would like to offer you an interview.”

“I—wow,” Bellamy stutters. “Um, wow, yeah. Thank you, that would be great.”

“Wonderful. You’ll be expected to prepare and deliver a brief fifteen minute presentation on the history topic of your choice as well as sit the interview. The interview will take approximately ninety minutes and will take place next Thursday, April second, at 3:00pm.”

The bounding excitement stopped, fell with a thud to the pit of his stomach. “Oh. Ah, are there any other interview times available?”

There’s a pause, then, “I’m afraid not, Mr. Blake. Will you be accepting the interview?”

Shoving his hand through his hair, he paces. “Can I confirm with you tomorrow?”

“That’s fine. Just call this number by four in the afternoon at the latest.”

“Okay.” Bellamy lets out a breath. “Thank you.”

“Have a good night.”

He hangs up and stares at the phone in his hand for a moment, then grits his teeth and shoves it in his pocket before stalking back toward the table.

Clarke is dragging a fork through the dregs of chocolate sauce left on their dessert plate, which she drops when she sees his face.

“Everything okay?” she asks as he flops into his chair.

He lets out a breath. “Yeah. It was a college—they offered me an interview.”

Her eyebrows shoot up in surprise before she smiles and grabs his hand. “That’s amazing, Bellamy!”

“Yeah,” he says.

She must hear it in his voice, because those little lines between her brows appear as she frowns slightly. “Is it not? I thought that’s what you wanted.”

“No, yeah, it is,” he says. “It’s just—I haven’t accepted yet. The only time they had available was three on Thursday. _Next_ Thursday.”

Her brow stays puzzled, then clears. “My appointment.”

“Yeah,” he sighs, and turns his hand over under hers so their fingers can interlace. “I really don’t want to miss it, Clarke.”

“I can try to reschedule,” she offers. “But Dr. Nyko’s usually booked out pretty far.”

“No, don’t.” Bellamy tries a smile. “It’s still good, right? I got offered an interview. I’ll probably be offered another somewhere else.”

“Yeah, but you were _definitely_ offered one there, now,” Clarke says firmly. “And you’re going to take it.”

“Clarke—”

“No,” she says. “You’re going to call them back and accept the interview, and you’re going to go next Thursday, and you’re going to blow their minds, okay? There are going to be so many other appointments you can go to.”

“I’ve already missed so many,” he says quietly. “I didn’t want to miss any more of them. Or for you to go alone.”

“I know,” Clarke replies, giving his hand a soft squeeze. “But it’s for a good reason, and I’ll bring someone with me, okay? I won’t be alone. And you’ll be there for the other ones.”

Bellamy swallows. “Do you really think I should take it?”

“Bellamy. I really do. It’s a no-brainer.” By the end, she's exasperated again.

He smiles in spite of himself. “If you say so.”

* * *

It’s dark when they leave the restaurant, and Clarke is leaning heavily into his side, as much for warmth as for her sleepiness. It’s a lot colder by the ocean than it is inland, and he revs up the heater as soon as he starts the car.

“You can sleep if you want,” Bellamy offers as they head back toward the freeway that will take them home.

“No,” she says. “I’m not tired.” She hides the following yawn behind a hand.

He laughs. “Seriously, Clarke. It’s been a long day. It’s okay.”

“We’re still on our date!” she protests, and struggles to push herself further upright in the seat. She’d been sliding down into a boneless heap until then. “I don’t want to sleep.”

“Okay,” he says patiently. “Well, what do you want to do instead?”

“Nothing that’s very safe to do in a moving car,” she says, and when he chokes, she grins wickedly at him. “Just kidding.”

“Warn a guy,” he replies, gruff, once he’s caught his breath, but now he’s thinking about doing _things_ in cars with Clarke and wondering if she actually put on the fancy underwear Raven had apparently packed her.

“Mm. Sorry,” she says, sounding completely unrepentant, and turns a little in her seat to get more comfortable. When he glances over, her eyes are heavy-lidded, and he hands are cradling her belly.

“What’s she doing?” he asks, and Clarke smiles.

“Not much. Just a little wiggling here and there. I think she’s too crowded by all the chicken parmesan I ate to do much else.”

“Still.”

“Yeah. Still. It’s pretty amazing.”

“Will you, uh—” Bellamy licks his lips. “Will you tell me when I can feel it? From the outside?”

She looks up at him. “Of course I will,” she says, soft. “But you don’t have to wait, okay?” She holds out a hand. They’re on a pretty deserted stretch of freeway, and he lets her take his hand while he keeps the other on the wheel. She presses his palm to her belly, on the side; it’s firm and warm, like he remembers.

“There?” he asks. His voice sounds a little scratchy, but it’s just from all the wind, probably. It was really windy on the coast all day.

“Yeah. Kind of feels like little twitches every now and then.”

She keeps his hand there, her fingers curled around him, and they talk quietly until she drifts off to sleep for the rest of the ride.

He doesn’t want to miss this, miss any of it—miss feeling their baby under his hand, miss seeing her on the ultrasound, but god, if he’s going to have to miss it for that interview, it had better be fucking worth it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you're still reading, thank you! Let me know your thoughts if you get a chance. (Please ignore any discrepancies between this chapter's plot and it being Saturday in the fic; I'm taking a little creative license.)
> 
> Also: if you live in the United States and are registered to vote, please DO SO! Please please please. Tomorrow is election day, and the last day to make your vote count. 
> 
> Thanks!


	15. Chapter 15

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> don't look at me

The thing Clarke remembers first upon waking the next morning is the kiss.

Though she hadn’t meant to, she had ended up sleeping most of the way home, only starting awake when the hum of the engine abruptly cut off. After Bellamy grabbed her things and walked her to her door, she’d drawn him down into what was meant to be a languid kiss— _meant_ being the key word.

She’d ended up with her back pressed up against her own front door, his body warm against her front, his hand large and hot against the thigh she’d somehow wrapped around him. She’d been covered in goosebumps, but he’d been the one to shiver when she tugged at the curls at the nape of his neck, the one to breathe her name between hurried breaths and tongues and moans.

Only the jaw-cracking yawn that escaped her just as his fingers brushed the edges of the fancy underwear she’d bought a few days earlier brought them out of it.

Clarke grins at the ceiling as she stretches, toes wiggling under her comforter.  

After she showers and makes herself a cup of decaf tea, she knocks on Raven’s door, then lets herself in.

Raven’s room is a disaster, clothes strewn in a trail from her open closet door to the bed, tiny bottles and vials spilling out of an oversized toiletry bag; the small desk in the corner is buried under papers and a few shiny bits of metal.

“Morning,” Clarke says, and clears a spot on the bed, heedless of all the junk.

“What’s so good about it?” Raven asks. Her hair is falling out of the knot she’d secured with a mechanical pencil, and she’s still in the tank top and boxers she sleeps in as she mutters under her breath.

“Who said it was good?” Clarke asks, innocent. “I didn’t say it was good. All I said was ‘morning.’”

Raven sends her a baleful look.

Clarke smiles in response. “It’s a _great_ morning.”

“For _some_ of us, maybe,” her friend grumbles, lifting a stack of jeans and exclaiming when she finds another bit of metal that, to Clarke’s eyes, looks just the same as the ones on her desk. “For those of us who _aren’t_ getting felt up on the porch and have to pack for a trip to stupid Pennsylvania, it’s a little less magical.”

“I’ll feel you up on the porch before you leave for your flight,” Clarke offers generously. “And you said you liked Philadelphia last time you lectured at UPenn.”

Raven grunts and dumps a pile of slacks and blouses on Clarke’s lap; she barely manages to keep her tea from sloshing all over the clothes. “Fold those. Last time I went as part of a panel, not the keynote speaker.”

She sets her mug on the bedside table and starts folding. “Yeah, but everyone else on the panel was an asshole, and you carried the whole thing anyway. I watched it on youtube. Bag.”

Raven plunks the suitcase down next to Clarke, who starts compacting clothes into tidy squares.

“Yeah, yeah,” she says, but she’s smiling now. “How was the big mystery date?”

“Apparently it wasn’t much of a mystery to you,” Clarke says dryly. “Considering the bag you packed for me.”

“Friends don’t let friends get felt up in their granny panties, Clarke.”

“I can always count on you.”

* * *

She paints for an hour or so, bold reds and purples and oranges, all hot and evocative against the canvas, and texts Bellamy back when he complains about being expected to come up with a hire-worthy presentation in only four days.

_don’t try to convince me u don’t have like fifty nerdy topics outlined somewhere, i’m pretty sure that’s what u do in ur spare time_

He takes a minute to reply. Finally, _have you been talking to my sister?_

She smiles and sends him a picture of a dog with encouraging signs tied to his collar.

Raven’s flight leaves just before two, so Clarke drops her at the airport on her way to Monroe’s for lunch. She’ll be gone for a week, giving several talks for the robotics engineering program at UPenn and leading some smaller workshops for the students.

“Tell Monroe hi. And tell Murphy he’s a dick,” Raven says cheerfully, hugging Clarke outside the departures.

“Don’t worry, I’m sure he’ll be missing you too,” Clarke says. “Ooh, save me some of the peanuts. It’s been ages since I’ve had crappy airline peanuts.”

“You could still come with me,” Raven says temptingly. “All the crappy airline peanuts could be yours for the low, low price of a transcontinental plane ticket.”

Beneath the words is a current of nerves, and Clarke squeezes her one more time.

“No, I told you. When you have to pee every five minutes, airplanes are the last thing you want to deal with. But you’ll do great. Try to have some fun without me, okay?”

Heaving a dramatic sigh, Raven picks up her bag. “I always have fun. See you Saturday.”

“See you Saturday,” Clarke echoes, and watches until Raven disappears into the terminal and a car honks at her to get out of the drop-off lane.

* * *

Clarke hands Murphy the paper bag of goat cheese medallions when she gets to their apartment a little after noon; when he glances inside, he lights up—or at least, lights up as much as Murphy ever does.

She looks on, a little bemused, as Murphy proceeds to make sure she’s tucked up on their couch, a glass of mint lemonade at hand and a plate of crackers and crumbles of goat cheese in her lap, all within minutes of her arrival.

“So. You’re not dead,” he says gruffly, and Monroe rolls her eyes at him.

“John, sit down.” He lets himself be tugged onto the loveseat next to his wife.

“Nope, still kicking. Also still pretty sure that I’m not dating a serial killer, but thanks for your concern.”

“Do you know how many serial killers’ exes have said the _exact same_ —”

“ _John_.”

“Yeah, yeah.”

They talk a little bit about the date, because even though Clarke had texted Monroe sporadically yesterday, in person is always better. Murphy looks deeply uncomfortable.

“Oh, and he got a job interview!” Clarke says, perking up a little. “This Thursday, at ARC.”

“Really? Sterling works in admissions and records there,” Monroe replies.

“Does he like it there?”

Her friend purses her lips. “Well—”

“He says it sucks balls,” Murphy says, dry. “And the college president is a fascist.”

Clarke sighs and eats a goat cheese cracker.

“I’m sure Bellamy will do great,” Monroe says brightly.

She shrugs and washes down the cracker with some lemonade. “Yeah, hope so.” She’s a grown adult, and it feels silly, but she _had_ promised Bellamy, so she asks. “So, are you guys busy that day?”

“Thursday? Actually, yeah; we’re taking off early from work and heading up to Murphy’s parents’ for the weekend. They do a big Easter thing every year.” Monroe says. Her eyebrows are raised in puzzlement. “Why, you want to come with or something?”

Clarke’s heart sinks a little. “Oh, um, no. No thanks. I just have a doctor’s appointment that day, and since Bellamy’s stuck in an interview…but it’s no big deal,” she adds hastily when she sees the two exchange a glance. That dumb married-couple nonverbal speak for _how can we rearrange our schedule and disrupt our lives to help out our pathetic friend_.

Or something like that. She probably didn’t get it word for word, but she gets the gist.

“What time is the appointment?”

Murphy is pulling out his cell, pulling up the calendar app on his phone while Monroe squints at the screen.

“I can call my mom, tell her we’ll be there in time for dessert instead,” he says. “That’s the best part, anyway; my cousins are always too stuffed from dinner to eat by then and the rest of us get a chance.”

“God, no, guys. Stop. Go and eat dinner with your family,” Clarke says, exasperated and embarrassed. “I’ve been to these on my own before; I can handle it, okay?”

“We really don’t mind,” Monroe says softly. “We’ll be there if you need us.”

“Well, thanks. But I do mind,” Clarke replies. Then she pins a glare on Murphy, albeit a soft one. “Hey, aren’t you supposed to be a chef or something? Crackers aren’t going to keep me going. I’m wasting away over here.”

They let her change the subject, and she lets Murphy offer her help off the couch she doesn’t really need, and they go into the kitchen to eat lunch.

* * *

By the next day, she’s not quite sure what she should do. Bellamy asked about it that morning, but she’d put him off, and he’d been so distracted over his debate on the Defenestration of Prague versus the more infamous but perhaps overdone lecture on Lincoln’s assassination that he hadn’t noticed.

But Raven’s across the country, and Monroe is going to be dealing with in-laws, and Clarke likes Maya, she really does, but an obstetric appointment doesn’t seem like the sort of “let’s be friends outside of the shop” activity she’s interested in suggesting to Maya.

If she were a normal person with a normal relationship with her mother, this is when she’d pick up the phone, call her mom, and ask her to come to the doctor’s appointment with her.

Clarke is not ready to pick up the phone and call her mother. 

It would be nice, she admits, to have family like that, family you call for appointments, family you go to visit on long weekends for celebrations.

Abigail Griffin is not that kind of family, though, and that’s okay, Clarke tells herself. She made her peace with that a long time ago. Really.

There are different kinds of families.

Clarke scrolls through her contacts and picks a different number.

* * *

“So why, exactly, did my sister call to tell me good luck today and also that she would see me later?”

“Because she’s going to see you later today,” Clarke says reasonably. “It’s simple logic, Bellamy.”

She’s sitting at the kitchen counter and sketching while he cooks her breakfast. It seems like anytime she’s around another human, but especially around Bellamy, she’s getting fed. But he’s nervous, she can tell, and she heard the hope in his voice when he called and asked if he could come make omelettes.

He seems to feel better when he’s fussing, so she lets him have this.

“I didn’t make plans with her,” he points out, then asks, head in the fridge, “When was the last time you ate a fruit or vegetable? There’s nothing in here.”

“Between twelve and seventy-two hours ago,” Clarke says, innocent; he makes a sound of disgust and starts chopping the tomatoes and avocados he brought with him. “And I made plans with her.”

She notices Bellamy nearly chop his own thumb when he fumbles the knife. “What?”

Turning back to her sketch, she sticks her tongue out a little as she sweeps the charcoal over the page with just the right curvature. “Hold on.” She adds a little shading, rubs the edge with the side of her hand, now gunmetal grey with residue, then nods and looks up at him. “You’ll see her at dinner.”

Clarke had insisted he come back over for dinner that night, after her appointment and his interview were over, so they could compare notes. Plus, it’s getting kind of offensive, this apparent belief that she’s incapable of feeding herself. She’s twenty-five years old, for god’s sake. She’s made it this long without keeling over.

“Okay,” he says after a pause. “Why?”

“Because I felt like it was rude to ask her to come to the doctor with me and then just kick her out of the car.”

“I think I’m lost.”

She shrugs a little. “Raven, Monroe, and Murphy are all out of town, and I promised you I’d get someone to go with me, so…”

Clarke can tell he’s struggling with it.

He confirms it when he says, “I’ll just cancel the interview. I’ll just cancel it, right? It’s not even that big of a deal, I mean—”

“Bellamy…”

His shoulders hunch.

“You’re being ridiculous,” Clarke says, gentle. “It’s important for you to go and you know that. I’ll be fine with Octavia, and I’ll see you as soon as you’re done.”

Bellamy sighs, then dumps all of the chopped ingredients into the pan.

“Yeah. I’m still sorry about missing the doctor, though. I didn’t mean to push my sister on you.”

“Stop. Seriously. It’s fine,” she replies. “I’m the one who called her, I don’t mind. It’s probably going to be nice,” she decides.

His face is skeptical.

“Really! I like her,” she says honestly. “And she’s the baby’s aunt. And she probably owns stock in Target now, after all the baby clothes she’s bought. She sounded excited about the appointment. If she doesn’t mind, and _I_ don’t mind, you shouldn’t mind, Bellamy.”

He _hmmphs_ and flips the omelette onto a plate before sliding it over to her. “You don’t mind _yet_.”

She hands him a fork and pats the stool next to hers. “Today is going to go great,” she declares. “I can feel it. Now eat up.”

Bellamy leaves just after lunch, which she insisted on making for him for a change, so he can go and get cleaned up for his interview. When she walks him out to his car, he leans down for a kiss goodbye, and she wraps her arms firmly around his waist before he can pull back. He’s warm and the scent of him has quickly become one of her favorite things.

“Stop stressing out about this. You’re going to blow them away,” Clarke commands, squeezing him a little tighter as his arms come around her.

His soft laugh rumbles in his chest, and when she looks up at him, he’s got that crooked smile.

“Here’s hoping, princess,” he says, and holds onto her for a little longer.

* * *

Clarke gets cleaned up herself and curls up with a book while she waits for Octavia, though she’s more engaged with the feeling of the baby moving around than she is with the plot. She’s so distracted by it she nearly misses the prompt knock at the front door at a quarter to three, but Octavia follows it up with three insistent pushes on the doorbell button. Clarke scrambles off the couch, albeit a little slower than she used to be able to, and opens her front door just as Octavia presses the button a fourth time.

Clarke raises an eyebrow as the bell plays through its melody; Octavia smiles brightly and says, “Are you ready?”

Shaking her head, she says, “Yeah, I’ve just got to grab my things. Come in for a minute.”

The second Octavia’s through the door, she’s prowling around the house as though she hasn’t been in it twice, poking her head through doorways, peering up the stairs toward Clarke’s room. Clarke watches, bemused, as she grabs her phone out of her bag and sends Bellamy one last _good luck!!!!!!!!!_ text.

She only says something when Octavia goes to open Raven’s door. “That one stays closed.”  

Octavia stops with her hand on the doorknob. “Is this your secret sex dungeon or something?”

“That’s exactly what it is,” Clarke says, dry. “Look, you want a tour, or do you want to keep acting like a total freak?”

“Up to you,” Octavia replies cheerfully.

Clarke snorts despite herself, but goes to point up the stairwell. “My bedroom and bathroom are upstairs. You can go look if you want, but I can only handle taking the stairs so often anymore.” Octavia motions for her to continue, and Clarke gestures at the different doors in the hall. “You’ve been in my studio, and that’s the second bathroom. This,” she says, tapping her so-called sex dungeon, “is Raven’s room, so you can bug her the next time you’re here if you want to see it that badly. Kitchen there, living room there, and this used to be Monroe’s room.”

Clarke opens the door to show the couple of boxes Monroe is still storing in there, the dust mites floating in the sunlight streaming through the open blinds.

“So is this going to be my niece’s room?”

Clarke blinks, then looks around the room again. It’s the smallest of the three bedrooms, but it has a big window with a view of the pool outside in the backyard. Monroe had left the walls a cheerful robin’s egg blue when she moved out.

“Yes,” she says. “This will be the baby’s room.” She’d always planned on it, in the practical sense of it, but she hadn’t yet reached the part of her pregnancy when her books said she’d be obsessed with nesting, so she hadn’t really looked at it with that kind of purpose.

“I like it,” Octavia declares with a decisive nod.

“Glad you approve,” Clarke says, and points her thumb over her shoulder. “Time to go.”

They leave Octavia’s bike and take Clarke’s car, and Octavia keeps up a fairly steady stream of chatter all the way to the doctor appointment and into the waiting room. As they sit, Octavia glances around in interest.

It’s only an obstetrics and gynecology office, not a general practice, so along with all of the overdone Monet prints hung on the wall that Clarke desperately wishes to help them replace, there are diagrams of female anatomy and pregnancy. The one that shows a full-term belly and the way all of the mother’s organs are displaced to make room for the baby always makes Clarke feel a little queasy, and the way Octavia quickly averts her eyes from that one seems to indicate she feels the same.

“So,” she says, gesturing at the diagram, “Did you always want kids?”

Clarke glances over at her. “Hypothetically. Of course, hypothetically those kids were also more intentional.”

Octavia snorts softly.

“Do you want kids?” Clarke asks, curious. It’s not usually the sort of thing she asks other people, but Octavia started it, so.

“Hypothetically,” Octavia repeats with a smile. “I mean, I’m a teacher; I _like_ kids. And I know Lincoln wants kids. He would be—” the smile grows softer. “He would be the best dad. ”

“He would.”

“Not that Bell would not also be the best dad,” Octavia adds graciously, and Clarke smiles. “Obviously, I turned out fabulously, so your little cantaloupe will be just fine.”

“Oh my god, did _everyone_ download the app that tells you what size fruit the baby is each week?”

“It’s valuable information, Clarke.”

Once they’re called back, Dr. Nyko takes her measurements and listens to the baby’s heartbeat, and Clarke tells him about feeling the baby move, and about her ankles and feet starting to swell.

“Swelling around twenty-four weeks is normal, and your blood pressure is perfect, but we’ll check your urine for protein to rule out preeclampsia. You’ll also take this home, and schedule your glucose test in a few weeks,” Dr. Nyko says, handing her a lab slip and a bottle of something that looks kind of like Gatorade. “But you’re right on track with everything else, Clarke. Baby looks good, and so do you.”

Clarke lets out a breath. It’s not that she ever expects something to be _wrong_ , but it’s still a relief each time Dr. Nyko tells her everything is going well.

Octavia’s hand slips into hers and squeezes tight.

Clarke squeezes back.

* * *

There’s an accident on the freeway that backs up the traffic for miles, so Bellamy actually manages to beat them home. He’s sitting on her front step, elbows braced on his knees. His suit jacket has been discarded and the sleeves of his button-down have been rolled up, and Clarke can’t decide if it’s a good thing or a bad thing that Octavia’s there to prevent her from jumping Bellamy right then and there.

Come on, she can’t be _blamed_ —his arms are fucking unreal.

He rises to his feet as they pull into the driveway and is opening Clarke’s door for her as soon as she puts the car into park.

“Hi,” she says, smiling as he offers his hand to help her out of the car.

“Hi,” he says, and wraps her up in a hug. Surprised, it takes her a second to hug him back.

“Everything go okay?” she ventures after a little bit.

Bellamy sighs, and Octavia says, “Oh my god, stop being so dramatic, Bell.”

He finally lets go of Clarke just so he can properly glare at his sister, whose arms are crossed as she taps her foot impatiently.

“Glad to know you still have no concept of good manners,” Bellamy snarks.

“I know, whoever raised me did a shit job,” she agrees, and points toward the door into the house. “But at least I’m not making a pregnant woman with swollen ankles stand around in the garage.”

Bellamy’s eyes drop immediately to Clarke’s ankles. “Shit, are you okay?”

“I’m _fine_ ,” Clarke says, eyeing Octavia, who smiles and shrugs. “But yeah, let’s go inside.”

She leads the way, glancing back once at the sound of a scuffle to see Bellamy with Octavia in a headlock as he viciously ruffles her hair.

“I’m so grateful my child will have such a calm and mature family,” Clarke says.

They eat a simple meal together and Clarke recounts the details of her doctor’s visit, Octavia chiming in every time she thinks Clarke’s leaving out anything at all. When she mentions that Dr. Nyko was testing her for preeclampsia, Bellamy sets his jaw, but calms a little as she says it’s unlikely for her to have it.

After he promises to get time off to go with her for her glucose test in a few weeks, it’s his turn.

“So? How did the interview go?”

“I honestly have no idea,” he replies. “Like, my presentation was solid, but the interview—I don’t know, it just seemed like they didn’t like my answers.”

“They probably just don’t know how to have proper poker faces,” Clarke tries reasoning, and the corner of his mouth quirks up.

“Yeah, maybe.”

“If they don’t hire you, they’re morons,” Octavia says, frowning.

“Yeah, let’s go with that,” he agrees, but even though he smiles, it doesn’t seem to reach his eyes.

* * *

“Was it okay? Having Octavia with you?” he asks later, after his sister has gone.

She shrugs, snuggling a little further into his side. “It was fine. I’d gotten pretty used to going on my own, but it _is_ kind of nice to have another person there.”

“Good.” She feels him press a kiss against her hair, and she closes her eyes.

“I did wonder,” Clarke says, focusing on the scent of him, on the rise and fall of his chest under her cheek, “you know. What it would have been like to have my mother there instead of Octavia.”

“Yeah?” Bellamy replies, voice neutral. He strokes his thumb over her arm.

“Just a little,” she hedges.

“When you imagined it, how did it seem? Good, bad, horrific?”

She thinks about, really thinks. “Not horrific. I don't know if it would have been good, but it wasn't horrific. In my imagination. Obviously, I don't know how it would actually go, but…”

It could be as bad as she feared, as bad as she’d told Bellamy it would be.

Or it could be...different. Maybe.

“But there's only one way to find out for sure,” Bellamy points out.

Clarke bites her lip. “If I do—if I do decide to find out, for sure, will you go with me?”

“Go with you?” He sounds surprised.

“It seems like the type of thing I should do in person. You know, if I actually do it.”

Bellamy shifts, tilts her chin up until she opens her eyes and looks at him.

“Hey. I’ll go anywhere you want me to go, Clarke.”

Then he kisses her, and she believes him. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No offense to American River or anyone who goes/teaches/works there; I'm sure it's a very nice school that I used shamefully for this fic.


	16. Chapter 16

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bellamy tries something new.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> At least I didn't take as long this time...
> 
> But really, as of yesterday I'm completely finished with my summer classes, and also yesterday was A Day, so I wanted to work on BSD. Hope you enjoy!

At this stage in her pregnancy, Clarke is getting more and more uncomfortable, but instead of wanting to take it easy because of it, it just makes her restless. She showed up at Grounders four times last week while Bellamy was working, just so she could get out of the house. It had been nice to see her, even though he’d felt bad she had to come all the way downtown to do it.

He’s been working as much as possible in the last couple of weeks. He hasn’t heard back from American River since his interview, and he hasn’t gotten any other leads, and after he stumbled upon an article titled “1,001 Newborn Must-Haves” he might have been panicking about trying to afford everything the baby needs _and_ a new place that would be big enough for a kid.

Seriously. _One thousand and one._

“There’s no way the baby needs over a thousand things, Bellamy,” Clarke says, and pats his arm. “It was probably just clickbait.”

Today, at least, they’d been able to make plans instead of Clarke having to come to his job just to talk to him. He’s taken the day off, and they’re walking through the park until Clarke gets hungry, tired, or has to pee. Whichever comes first; neither of them can predict it anymore.

“That’s what you think now,” Bellamy says darkly, “but when she’s screaming in the middle of the night because you didn’t buy that thousandth must-have, you’re going to feel real shitty.”

“Oh, I am, am I?”

“Yeah, and what are you going to do then?”

“Isn’t that what I have you for?” she says, bumping his hip with hers. “I’m pretty sure that between the two of us we’ll be able to manage her.”

It gives him pause, that assumption that he’ll be around when their daughter is screaming in the middle of the night. He wants to be, of course he wants to be—but it’s not something they’ve talked about yet, how their parenting is going to work logistically when the baby is born.

Will he stay with them at first? The baby will be so small, it would be impossible to try shared custody between them at first, and he can’t imagine wanting to be away from either of them at the beginning.

“Hey, you okay?” Clarke says, and he looks at her. She’s flushed from the warm spring air and their brisk pace, and god damn, does he want to kiss the puzzled look off her face.

So he does. Her lips are slick with cherry flavored chapstick and her hair tickles his cheeks as the breeze picks up.

She drops his hand and curls her palms in his shirt, tugging him closer until her belly bumps into him.

A satisfied smile curls her lips when she finally pulls back, and something behind him has her snorting and burying her face in his chest.

“What?” he says. “What is it?”

“Our public display of affection seems to have deeply offended that couple behind you,” she says, voice muffled.

He risks a glance over his shoulder and sees an older man glaring at them. His glare deepens when he sees Bellamy looking and Clarke peeking around Bellamy, but the other man with him makes shushing motions and then smiles and waves at them.

“You two are lovely together,” he calls.

“Thanks,” Bellamy manages to get out before Clarke buries her face in his chest again and bursts into badly stifled laughter.

* * *

To no one’s surprise, Clarke has to pee not long after that, so they head back to his place.

They end up settled on the couch, and Bellamy tries not to argue too much when Clarke suggests watching _Hercules_ on Netflix.

He thinks he’s doing an okay job of it until Clarke raises a brow and says, “Is this why Octavia told me to try and pick _Hercules_?”

“Octavia told you?” he repeats, then scowls. “Yeah, no, of course Octavia told you.”

She pats his hand. “Oh, Bellamy. You have a lot of feelings about this cartoon, don’t you?”

“The real question is, why don’t _more_ people have feelings about that movie?” he grumbles.

“Probably because it’s meant to be entertaining for small children,” she says.

“That doesn’t mean it should be _wrong_.”

Instead of rolling her eyes or changing the subject like Octavia and Miller learned to do a long time ago, Clarke makes a show of settling in and saying, “Well, how should they have done it?”

He pauses. “Uh, are you sure you want to know? Once I get started, it’s kind of hard to get me to stop.”

The heat in his face is _not_ a blush, damn it. He’s just too cheap to turn his air conditioning down and it’s a little hot in here. That’s all.

“I’m all ears,” she assures him, mouth quirking at one corner.

He finally smiles back and says, “Okay, well, keeping in mind all the things Disney got wrong, the story _should_ have gone something like this.”

Bellamy does it right, pacing the story as he builds the action up and brings it back down, even adding in a couple punchlines that make Clarke laugh. And to be honest, he’s feeling pretty proud of himself by the time he gets to the end of the story, but when he finally says, “The end,” Clarke doesn’t say anything.

He tries his best not to feel put out, but she’s even got a funny look on her face.

“Uh,” he says after a minute. “Clarke? You okay?”

“Bellamy…” she says slowly, still frowning a little.

He raises his eyebrows. “Yeah?”

“Have you ever thought of writing?”

A little taken aback, he blinks. “Huh. Uh, well. I’ve written a lot of papers, you know, for my master’s. I’d thought about maybe trying to get them published in a book one day.”

“No,” she says, “like _really_ writing.”

“Wow, thanks.”

Before he can say anything else, she puts her hand on his arm. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it like that. I just meant—fiction. Or creative nonfiction. Something for kids.”

He lets the tension leave his jaw, lets it go. “No, I haven’t done anything like that.”

She nods, then says, “Well, I think you should.”

She’s so decisive in her declaration that it takes a second for Bellamy to realize what she said. It was more the tone of voice that one would say, “Climate change is real,” or “I don’t like that restaurant.”

“Considering I have zero experience with creative writing, yeah, that makes sense.”

“Bellamy, come on!” Clarke says. “I think you’d be really good at it. Way better than Disney.”

He’s skeptical about the whole thing, but Clarke looks so earnest, it’s hard to discard the idea entirely.

“Okay,” he grants. “Sure. Maybe I’ll try writing sometime.”

Clarke beams and plants her hands on the couch, leveraging herself to a standing position before he can think to offer to help.

“No time like the present,” she says, and goes over to the kitchen table where his old laptop is charging.

“Wait, what? Now?” Bellamy says, following.

“Yup,” Clarke replies, popping the ‘p.’

“How?” he says helplessly.

“Just—I don’t know, pick a story and write down like you’d want to tell it to the baby,” Clarke suggests.

Bellamy frowns. “If I wanted to tell it to the baby, I’d just tell it to the baby.”

Clarke sighs, and starts herding him back toward his couch. “Okay, then. Let’s say that, I don’t know, you get the flu. Baby’s too little to be exposed to your gross germs, so you’re in quarantine, but you want her to hear the story. I volunteer, but you’ve got to write it down _exactly_ how you’d want me to tell it, each word.”

“In this scenario,” Bellamy begins, and she waits expectantly. “Do I survive the flu, or do I suffer complications?”

“Bellamy!”

“Fine,” he grumbles, flopping onto his back on the couch, and lets out an _oof_ when she drops his laptop on his stomach.

“What are you going to do?” he asks, fully aware of how petulant his voice sounds. But it just _sounds_ that way; he’s _not_ petulant.

“I’m going to make something to eat,” she informs him, “because I’m pregnant and hungry.”

He immediately feels terrible. “Jesus, why didn’t you say something? I could’ve—”

“I did just say something,” she replies tartly, and plants her hands on his shoulders to push him back down into a sitting position. “And I’m perfectly capable of feeding myself.”

“You’re hungry,” he says. “I should—”

“Oh my god,” she says. “Bellamy, if you’re going to jump up and fix me something to eat every time I’m hungry for the rest of this pregnancy, you’re never going to sleep. I’m hungry all the fucking time, okay? Just let me take care of it.”

He sighs heavily.

Clarke points at him. Her nails are painted a pale lavender. “ _Write_.”

“Make me,” he mutters, then shifts guiltily when she glares at him. “Fine, okay. Okay.”

Clarke disappears into the kitchen, and Bellamy opens his laptop.

There are gentle tinkering sounds as Clarke tries to rummage through his cupboards and drawers without clanging pots or banging doors, and eventually the blinking cursor has taunted him long enough.

He doesn’t know where to start or what to write, so he just picks one of his favorite myths and slowly starts typing. Bellamy only looks up when Clarke sits on the couch next to him, a sliced apple and peanut butter on the plate she balances on one leg.

“That’s it?” he asks.

“Shut up and write,” she replies, and crunches into an apple slice. “Dinner’ll be ready in an hour and a half.”

But he’s already writing again, mistyping the same word five times in a row because he’s so rushed to get it out and move on to the next. It’s—fun, actually, trying to imagine how he would tell it to a little girl, what words he would choose and how he’d change the story. Not the integrity of the story, but just enough to make it palatable for her, until she’s old enough for the next version. For the most part, he’s all in favor of telling kids the truth about things when they ask—about why people lie, about what’s in this casserole, about where babies come from—but there’s a difference between being an honest parent and needlessly traumatizing small children with graphic mythological stories.

 He gets stupidly into it, making little bracketed notes where he thinks a page break should be, and what scenes would ideally be illustrated. He knows actual publishers probably make all those decisions, but this is just a stupid little draft Clarke wants him to write, nothing serious that he’d actually send out.

Who knows though. Maybe one day he’ll print it out, ask Clarke to doodle a few pictures for it. Give it to the baby. That could be nice.

Clarke prods him on the shoulder and he drags his gaze from the screen to blink blearily at her.

She’s somewhat blurry, but he’s pretty sure she’s frowning when she strokes her thumb between his eyebrows.

“You’ve got, like, a billion lines right here,” she tells him. “You should go to the optometrist.”

He just blinks at her some more, the gentle warmth of her fingers on his skin making his brain go soft.

“Dinner’s ready.”

“You said an hour and half,” he replies, puzzled, and she laughs at him.

“I did,” she says. “And dinner is ready.”

He checks the clock on his laptop and nearly chokes; it’s been closer to two hours since he’d last registered the time.

On cue, his stomach growls, and it’s not cute.

“Come _on_ ,” Clarke insists, and steals his laptop from him.

“Wait!” he blurts out, but Clarke just taps a few keys and shuts the lid.

“Don’t worry, I saved it,” she soothes, and he lets her take his hands and pretend like she’s actually helping him get up off the couch.

“What did I even have for you to make?” he wonders as she tugs him through to the kitchen.

She shrugs, and tells him to get down bowls as she stirs a pot on the stove.

“I made chicken tortilla soup,” she says.

He sets the bowls down and stares at her. “You just...made chicken tortilla soup.”

It sounds, well, amazing, and also not like something he would have ever thought to make with the weird assortment of leftovers in his fridge.

“Before you’re too impressed with me, I used one of those websites where you type in your available ingredients and it offers suggestions,” she tells him, a smile curving the corners of her mouth. “Also, no promises, because the recipe said to do a lot of it in steps and instead I just dumped it in the pot and left it.”

“Seems right,” he says, and peeks over her shoulder as she stirs again. “Looks good.” Bellamy inhales deeply. “Smells good.” Spicy and fragrant.

He pulls back and she glances at him. “Is this going to be too spicy for you?” he asks, concerned.

“I haven’t had a problem with spicy food yet,” she says, and turns off the stove. “Carry that, would you?”

She fishes around for a pot holder, sets it on the table so he can put down the pot of soup. “Yesterday I ate a whole jalapeño like a carrot stick.”

He blanches a little at the thought. “Fuck.”

“It was delicious,” she says, and sits in the chair he pulls out for her. “But you didn’t have any fresh.”

“They’re not one of my staples,” he replies dryly, and ladles soup into their bowls. Two glasses of ice water, a half empty carton of plain yogurt, and some thinly shaved pepperjack cheese are on the table; she shrugs when he raises a brow.

“You didn’t have sour cream, and I couldn’t find a cheese grater.”

“You could have asked,” Bellamy points out, and swallows a spoonful of soup.

It’s good, spicier than he expected, but good. It’s also way too hot, and he fishes an ice cube out of his glass for his mouth.

“Did you burn your tongue?” she asks in between delicately blowing on her spoon. “You’re supposed to blow on it, doofus.”

“Why do I like you?” he grumbles, but there’s probably something wrong with him because the casual insult just makes him like her more.

It’s probably Octavia’s fault. She’s conditioned him to associate affection with insult.

“Because you impregnated me with your spawn,” Clarke says, finally tastes the soup, then reaches for the yogurt. “It’s a biological imperative.”

Bellamy frowns. “Or it could be because I like _you_ ,” he says, and she shrugs.

“Sure.”

“Clarke…”

“Bellamy…” she mimics, then points her spoon at him. “Eat your dinner.”

* * *

They clean up the ungodly mess waiting in the kitchen together, then Clarke settles in on the couch with her legs lying across Bellamy’s lap with his computer balanced on her bump.

When she’s done reading, she looks up at him. “You want me to say ‘I told you so’? Because I did. I told you so hard.”

“Shut up,” he says. His face is hot again; he _really_ needs to stop being so cheap about the air conditioner.

“You’re really good,” she replies, sing-song, and holds the laptop above her head when he tries to grab it back.

“Those don’t grow on trees, be careful.”

She lowers it back down. “Sorry.”

He squeezes her knee. “It’s fine.” It is.

She messes with the keys a bit more, then closes the laptop and sets it on the floor. She yawns.

“You want me to take you home?” he asks.

“Mm, not yet,” Clarke replies, and reaches for his hand. She’s started doing that in the last few weeks as the baby’s kicks get stronger and more frequent. He hasn’t felt anything yet, but he’s not going to say _no_ to Clarke, to his hand on her skin, warm and firm.

She places his hand on her belly, where her soft green top is riding up. When he moves his thumb over her skin, she shivers.

“Ticklish?”

She scowls at him. “Yes. Don’t abuse it.”

He bites back a smile as she shifts, getting a little more comfortable.

“Is she moving?”

“No, not yet. But spicy food usually gets her dancing. I’ll let you know.”

“Like mother, like daughter,” he teases, and she snorts.

“Yeah, my latest dance move is something I like to call ‘the beached whale.’ It’s super cute.”

“I’m a fan,” he says. He moves his fingers over her skin, deliberate, until she shivers again.

“Well,” she says, breath hitching as his hand slides higher under her shirt, and she tugs him closer until he’s caging her in. “I’m always happy to meet a fan.”

Her mouth is soft and open. She tastes spicy, but he can’t say he minds, because she’s eager and responsive, making little sounds as he licks into her, kisses the corners of her mouth, makes his way to her jaw, her neck. She moves so he’s cradled between her thighs, and he places an open-mouthed kiss on her clavicle, tugging her shirt out of the way.

The strap of her bra peeks out, dark rose against pale skin.

Clarke rucks up the back of his shirt, running her hands over his spine until he lets out a shaky breath of his own.

His hand finds her breast, palms it over her bra.

“Shit,” Clarke squeaks, and Bellamy freezes. 

“Is this okay?”

“Yes, just—they're sore. A little less pressure would be good.”

He gentles his touch, barely grazing his fingertips against her. "Like this?"

“ _Yes_ ,” she says, and arches into him. “Oh, don’t look so smug,” she adds, and he shrugs, tugging her neckline down even further until he can press his lips against the swell of her breast.

“Nevermind,” Clarke says. “You can look as smug as you want. I don’t care.”

They’re both laughing when he moves back up to kiss her again, her hands continuing to stroke over his back as their mouths slow, become languid.

His thumb works her nipple through the lace of her bra until she’s panting into his mouth, nails digging into his back. The sounds she’s making are driving him crazy, the way her thighs tighten around his hips has his own breathing ragged.

He runs a finger under the lace edge of her bra, and she huffs, pushing his hand aside. Bellamy blinks and eases back, but she just grasps the hem of his shirt and tugs insistently.

“Off, please.”

“Well, yeah, since you asked nicely.” He pulls it over his head and throws it to the floor; Clarke’s eyes drop to his chest, his abs, and stay there until he smirks and pulls on her own top.

“Your turn?”

“What? Oh, yeah. Yes.” She looks a little dazed, her cheeks flushed and eyes roving over him, but she lets him help her sit up fully so he’ll be able to pull off her shirt.  

Then right before he does, she says, pressing a hand against his chest, “Wait—wait.”

He is eighty-two percent sure he is going to die, but he stops. “Is everything okay?”

“What? Oh, yes, I’m sorry,” Clarke says, and kisses him quickly. “She just started kicking, and I thought—” She gives him a half smile, bares her belly and pulls his hand to her skin. “She already has excellent timing, doesn’t she?”

“Yeah,” Bellamy says absently, but he doesn’t really have any idea what Clarke just said, because right there, under his palm, he can feel her. The little pushes against his hand are faint, but unmistakeable.

“You can press harder,” Clarke says. “It won’t hurt me.” He glances at her, then presses more firmly.

The baby kicks harder against his hand as if in reply.

“Wow,” he breathes.

She kicks, and kicks, and kicks.

“It’s really something, huh?” she says softly.

Bellamy looks up at her. “Yeah,” he gets out. “Clarke, I—”

She cards her fingers through his hair, and he closes his eyes for a brief moment. “What?”

“I’m so glad you found me,” he says finally. His voice doesn’t break, although it’s embarrassingly gravelly. “I just—I can’t stand the thought of missing this.”

Maybe Octavia and Clarke are right and he needs glasses. Everything is awfully blurry right now.

“I’m glad I found you, too,” she says quietly.

He ends up lying with his head in her lap, feeling the baby move and watching Clarke’s skin shift with the stronger movements. She keeps dancing for a long time, and Clarke keeps running her hands through his hair. Whenever he manages to tear his eyes away and look up at her, Clarke seems pensive.

“Bellamy? You think it really would have hurt that much if I hadn’t found you and told you about the baby yet?” she asks finally. “If you were missing this?”

Bellamy’s not sure they’re talking about him anymore, but he answers anyway. “It’s not really something I could ever get back, Clarke. Yeah, I do.”

She nods. “Okay.”

After a while, when the baby has finally calmed and they’re certain she’s done with her acrobatics for the moment, Clarke sighs and nudges Bellamy off her lap. As he watches, she pulls her phone out, scrolls through her contacts. Her free hand grasps for his, and he gives it to her, perplexed. Her fingers are trembling.

Clarke takes a deep breath, then hits a button. He can hear the line ringing.

A male voice answers. Bellamy sees her swallow, and then Clarke says, “Hi, Marcus.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let me know your thoughts! I hope you all have a lovely weekend. Treat yo self. Do a face mask. I'm going to.


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